I wanted to do a breakdown on my uke - at least for anyone who may be interested.

I got the bari strung up and the frets from buzzing now. They were buzzing because I made my corian saddle about a mm too low. That has been remedied and I'm in love. I did NOT (yet) put the pickup in the uke. It's pretty loud in fact.

The sound board was done like you saw at the hana lima plans or what they call "Sneider-kasha" style with a little modification. With the bracing radiating out from under where the bridge is seated. I was concerned that I had too much bracing, but I was very happy to find that it was quite the opposite. When you strum or pick the strings the whole top vibrates very nicely. This is not significant by itself, but it is if you think about tonal quality. As I can pluck a string and it sounds nice and deep. If I press my palm on the top of the uke(with a little pressure of course), you can hear the sound changes. It's an awesome thing really. Like having wha wha bar on it (Whatever you want to call it)

I have picked up several ukes here locally baritones and others and mine, if I do say so, sounds deeper than any other I picked up. (OK I admit, I havent touched ukemans ukes lol)

I like the bridge too-less the material than the way it's working. The saddle was only half as tall as it should have been, that was easily fixed. The saddle is glued to the top directly and under the top there is a 1/8 mohogony ply plate which those braces radiate from. The strings are tied to a ceramic bead and pulled through the brace, top and bridge. The good thing about this is that it's not pulling on the bridge, it's only pushing down on the saddle. So with that, I'm happy. I may later add little brass eyelets to insert inside the holes on the bridge.  I have some somewhere that will fit.

The hardest part of building this uke aside fomr waiting was not the finish, amazingly enough finishing doesn't bother me, its just slow and time consuming. The hardest part was bending the [Zebrawood, koa and mango] wood for the binding.

You may wonder, what would you do different? I've asked myself this, and I can honestly say, nothing.


I'm pretty sure the next one will be a Bari Cutaway.

Bee You tiful! Thanks for sharing Eric!
Fixed your link bud, no need the extra quotes

http://devineguitars.com/htmlContent/index.htm

Wow Dom, sorry to hear about your woes. It sure did come out looking sweet though. I hope you get the scale sorted out- be a shame to let this one go.

Thanks you guys.  RC, I was wondering where you have been.  I was even thinking about starting a post to see if anyone had heard from you.  I was concerned something may be wrong.  I hope that is not the case.

The top, back and sides are book matched walnut from some scrap I had.  There were some knots that I had to fill with epoxy.  The neck is mahogany and the fretboard and bridge are rosewood.  Originally, it was just some sides for practicing with my bender but since the bending went good I decided to use them in the uke.

The French Polish finish doesn't look too bad considering what the uke has been through in the process.  Twice during the process I stripped all the shellac off to start over including a layer of Bulls Eye spray shellac that I had to steel wool off.  My biggest problem early on was having the pad way too wet which caused streading and swirls everywhere.  At one point the finish had great depth and an incredible shine.  But when you looked at it in direct light it looked horrible because of the swirls and streaks.  It really needs more sessions but I have had all I can take at this point.

After sleeping on it I have decided to wait and let the strings continue to stretch before hacking up the bridge.  It is starting to stay in tune and doesn't sound near as bad as I thought.  It still needs to be changed to have accurate intonation but I am going to wait and think about the options that may be available to remedy the situation before diving in.
Dominator

Wow Jesse that's some link! Thanks for sharing that great info!! I like cheap and easy, make life sweet sometimes doesnt it .

Thanks Dale,
You know the more I play it the more I may not even change it.  I thought it was much worse than it is when the strings were still stretching a lot.  I am an aggressive player and am finding that when I play up the neck the chords don't sound that bad.  They may be a bit flat but I don't hear it.  Especially, if playing with a bit of vibrato.  The open C is a tad off but not enough at this point to tear into it.  My playing style makes chords up the neck sound sharp on my Fluke and it has good intonation.  It is nice to have the chords not be so sharp.  I think I will chalk it up to experience and look forward to number 002.

Sorry to hear about the side blowout.  Keep us posted on your progress.
Dominator

Shoot Big Uke you build that uke ya better git pictures man.And i would love to see blue prints of that puppy.Till then good luck good eyeballs and good hands.
                               Peace from da east
                                                  King Moonpie
                                                           James

Great Job Dale,
Its a shame that you weren't able to use your koa sides .  That back looks sweeet .  Your neck to body joint looks real nice.  What is your process for getting it to mate up?
Dominator