mike gregory - Posted - 02/15/2013:  12:28:18

Got to let the varnish dry, but here's how much I got done in about 2 or 3 hours.

Please note: I'm not trying to impress anybody with my abilities to produce a Finely Crafted Instrument here.

Just demonstrating how quickly an old guitar, which might not be worth restoring, can be converted into a "sort of" version of the wonderfully made  instrument which  Doc Fossey does so well

This is HIS----->

And below. as far as it's gotten, is mine.

Banjo and guitar, ready for conversion	Masked the neck	DISC sanding.	Power rasping the first 4 frets.
Bared neck wood

Chade - Posted - 02/15/2013:  14:00:59

I'm surprised the frets weren't a problem with the disc sander, what grit was the sanding disc?

mike gregory - Posted - 02/15/2013:  15:17:13

If I recall, 100.

Next time I'm downstairs, I'll read and reply.

Joe Sull - Posted - 02/15/2013:  15:23:22

Good job. lean right into it!

mike gregory - Posted - 02/19/2013:  13:17:26

--------------

Instead of a nice brass tube, I simply drilled behind the 5th fret, then took a saber saw blade, and made a groove along the neck/fingerboard interface, and let the string go through that.

A "ditch" instead of a tunnel.

And removing the FIRST peg leaves 2 on THAT side for the first & 2nd, same as a standard banjo.

I strung it up with a set of strings that have been laying around so long, they're new but corroded.

Fenders, with a 0.095 first & 5th.

Sounds 0.5 way decent. Discovered the heel is pulled out a bit. Might fix that the quick & ugly way, before I post a sound file.

mike gregory - Posted - 02/25/2013:  09:20:29

I tucked a fat little U.S. coin in the gap, just to show how far it was.

There's a hole visible through the heel.

Tee nut with  prongs to   catch the neck block goes inside, bolt gets tightened.

I promised this would be a fairly quick and perhaps cosmetically disgusting conversion.

Next step is to  get around to posting a sound file.

rcmoore - Posted - 02/25/2013:  11:05:14

Mike, Concerning your "ditch" instead of a tunnel for the 5th string to go into.  It just goes to show that most everything has been done before.  Take a look at my F.C. Wilkes banjo from the 1890s.  Looks like he beat you to it.

Bob Moore

mike gregory - Posted - 02/25/2013:  12:41:05

That doggone Wilkes family!

Uncle F.C. thunk up a string ditch, and cousin Booth shot Daniel Day Lewis.

And then there's the Sinful Skinful Nudist colony they run, out East, Wilkes-Bare, Pennsylvania, where they make millions, selling sunburn lotion to unsuspecting vacationers.

OK, seriously: Any idea that's a good idea, may have been thought up, even if not actually done, by other people, earlier.

Nuclear sub? Jules Verne, 1870..

Got a cellphone with a camera? Do any SKYPE? Well,  "TOM SWIFT and His PHOTO-TELEPHONE" was published in 1914.

We were watching 8mm home movies in 1959, and my dad predicted that some day, they's come up with a camera where you could shoot movies in the back yard, and show them through your TV set.

A few years later, Polaroid came up with 8mm self-developing film, only to have it superseded by the camcorder.

I was thinking that it would be fun to make those rubber fridge magnets in strips that looked like picture frame molding, for hanging kids' art.

A month or so later, I saw that item for sale in the local stores, and I never mentioned it to anybody.

xnavyguy - Posted - 02/25/2013:  14:49:49

Nice, innovative project. 

Good on you Mike!

mike gregory - Posted - 02/26/2013:  13:39:44

Sound File

hangoutstorage.com/jukebox.asp...D%3D29805

I did have to put a spike in, behind the 5th fret, to get the string to sit where I wanted it. And a bit of re-cutting on the bridge.

All in all, not bad for a quick, cheap conversion.