Life on the frozen tundra of South Dakota Life on the frozen tundra of South Dakota

A Guitar I Built For My Uncle

A Guitar I Built For My Uncle

Instrument completed on 1/17/2019

Instrument completed on 1/17/2019

Doug is my uncle. He's the youngest brother of my late father. He's also been playing guitar since he was young. He started playing on a cheap electric, but soon afterward switched to acoustic guitar which he's been playing for more than 40 years.

Being a guitarist as well as a family member, he expressed an interest in having me build him a guitar made from the wood cut from the walnut tree off the old farm. This is the same tree that produced the wood for my father's cremation urn and the Walnut Strat I built from the urn scraps.

Displaying either a great deal of trust or a great deal of poor decision making, he left a lot of the details up to me. His only real requests was that the walnut from the tree be featured, and the neck have a satin finish on it. Most everything else was left to my discretion.

When I finished this instrument and played it for the first time, two things immediately jumped out at me. First, it chorded like a dream. Open chords and bar chords on the lower half of the fretboard felt like they fretted themselves. It didn't play bad anywhere on the neck, but the ease of playing lower chords really jumped out at me.

Second, the neck pickup sound may be the best I've ever heard on any guitar anywhere. It is punchy and warm, but isn't muddy at all. It would be awesome for playing jazz. The other two pickup switch positions sound good, but the neck sounds so good it would be tempting to never touch the switch.

Here are the specifications of the instrument:

  • Neck Join Type: Bolt on

  • Neck Wood: Walnut with curly maple lamination strips

  • Truss Rod: Dual action, heel adjust

  • Neck Reinforcement: Two carbon fiber rods

  • Headstock: Angled, scarf jointed

  • Tuners: 3+3 Sperzel-style locking.

  • Nut: Cow Bone

  • Body Wood: Walnut top and bottom. Curly maple outside rim.

  • Body Features: Tundra Man "pudding" shape. Hollow. Inlaid top and bottom.

  • Fretboard: Ebony, 10" radius, dove inlays

  • Scale Length: 25.5"

  • Pickups: GFS Professional Series Alnico II Humbucker (bridge), Alnico V Humbucker (neck)

  • Controls: One volume, one tone, 3-way selector switch.

  • Hardware: Chrome. Schaller roller bridge.

  • Finish: Gloss nitrocellulose lacquer

  • Weight: Very light; probably in the 5-6 pound range.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Completed photo of Doug's guitar.

Curious how I built this guitar? Check out the construction photos here.

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This page last updated on 01/18/2019