Banjo Build

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vtsteam:
Simon I always seem to have bad luck with a router! I remember once rounding over the sheer clamp on a dory skiff i had built -- the topsides were painted, this rail was going to be finished bright -- I just needed to round it.

As I was going along, the bit raised a splinter, in a split second the router bit pin followed it in diagonally across the whote rail, pulling through the planking and all. The rail relieved of tension split and snapped out away from the topsides for a couple feet forward of the cut. What a mess! My new boat looked like somebody had taken a sledgehammer to the side!

I've had many router mishaps since, though none so serious, just ruined a lot of work -- I just don't trust the damn things. And they'e probably one of the most unpleasant tools to run ever invented. Loud and lookin for trouble! I'd ten times rather run a chainsaw than a router. Well I know many people use them every day with little problem. I just don't get along with them.

re. fire clay for luting: since case hardening temps aren't iron melting temps and the luting is temporary , I would guess that ordinary clays other than fireclay might work as well. But I don't think furnace cement is a good idea.

S. Heslop:
Yeah I know what you mean. I'm still hesitant to use a hand router. I bought a fairly fancy one a while back, the kind with a cylindrical body (that are hard to get ahold of in the UK), for another project that probably won't go anywhere. But I can't see myself getting a whole load of use out of it as is.

The router table though has made it much more controllable. But of course you can only route what you can fit onto the table...

S. Heslop:
Too many pictures in this post. I got carried away.

Put holes in the peghead using the template to locate.

Plenty of tearout though. The trick is to never drill all the way through with forstner bits, but drill from the other side (if possible) once the point of it starts poking through. I forgot though. Plus with the extra thickness of the burl face the peghead was too thick for the tuning machines. So I trimmed it further in the drum sander like before, in the way I said I wouldn't do again... but I did this right after id mucked the neck up so I figured it wouldn't be a big loss if it got flung out through the window or something.

Anyways that didn't happen.

Onto fixing yesterdays mistake. I decided edge binding would be the way to go, but didn't want to go searching for suitable plastics at a reasonable price, or wait for delivery on the 'proper' stuff.

So I cut this black ABS pipe I had bought for dust collection but never actually used.

Then got it soft with the brand new iron (hence the wax paper).

Clamped a flat board on it.

And it came out surprisingly flat with no curling back.

For routing the recess I made a... ring I guess you'd call it, for the bearing. To give about a 2.5mm depth of cut. I forget what the router bit originally was but I bought it for the drum sander.

I was originally going to try increasing the thickness of the ABS pipe material (which was about 2mm thick) by superglueing two bits together, but that didn't quite work out so well (it delaminated easily in a test), so I decided to rout to a lesser depth by putting a few layers of masking tape on the side of the wood where the bearing rides.

I don't often use superglue but I quite like how it waits for you. As far as I know it sets when no air can get to it. So it wasn't a problem gluing this much at a time.

Masking tape holds it on as it dries. It dries pretty fast but my fingers couldn't cover the whole thing.

It was then scraped down. Masking tape is there to prevent me from gouging the surface like I did on the test piece.

The final bit was sanded flush since I needed to slightly flatten the neck a bit anyways. Had a tiny bit of an S curve.

Looks pretty good for something that's just covering up a stupid mistake.

With the slightly lesser rout depth there's two spots that didn't get totally removed. I'm considering filling them, but I don't think they're particularly noticeable and they're far enough up the neck that i'm not worried about trying to bend strings into the divots.

I also removed the material to get access to the truss rod adjustment. I'll probably make a truss rod cover out of more ABS pipe, but i'm still deciding on the shape. I'm also going to edge bind the headstock since I bungled the cut and went into it a bit. I'll have to be careful to not bungle it backwards into the stuff I just did.

S. Heslop:
Decided to do the headstock tonight too.

Lost my lighter and the blowtorch packed in.

Just passing it through the flame to warm it.

So it's flexible enough to hold the shape. Whatever this plastic is, it holds its shape beautifully as it cools. No spring back at all.

Also cut the nut slot, perhaps a little too deep. I might glue a bit of wood back in.

Gonna go with a brass nut, part because it's what I have, but i'm also interested to see how much a difference it makes. I'd imagine it'd probably wear faster than more traditional materials.

vtsteam:
I like the ironed flat ABS technique!

I've flattened 4" PVC pipe before in an electric utility oven with plenty of ventilation. Heating slowl is the key, but never thought of an iron.

I'm thinking a homemade solar oven might be interesting to try for that, since slow and relatively low temp would seem to suit.

The banjo is coming along great and I like all the setbacks and watching them overcome towards a beatuiful instrument.

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