I wanted to make a ukulele with the longest possible scale that would still fit in my travel case.
Before staining the body, I made sure that everything fit properly.
The “Les Paul” style body was made with a single piece of cherry wood. The scale length is 19 inches, and its overall length is 21.5 inches. Even though the scale length is 19 inches, I tune it like a reentrant tenor/concert/soprano. I prefer that tuning and it works better with most of the ukulele sheet music that I have.
The fretboard and bridge are made of rosewood. The volume knob is made of ebony. A piece of plastic pipe directs the strings back towards the tuners.
I used transparent red nitrocellulose lacquer followed by nitrocellulose clear coat to give it a finish similar to Gibson’s “Heritage Cherry” finish.
The under saddle piezo pickup is soldered to a 500K ohm potentiometer to control the volume. The output jack is attached to an upside down stratocaster style jack plate.
See it in action!
how far apart are the strings by the nut and by the saddle? and what is the width of the fretboardby the nut and by the saddle? also what is the action height by the saddle? thanks. really cool build! ihave been looking and looking and i think i want to make this for my first project.
28 mm at the nut. 30 mm at the saddle. the fretboard is 37 mm wide all the way down. At the last fret (18th), the strings are 2.5 mm above the fret.
When you make something, we’d love to see it!
Hi my name is Cody. I’m 13 years old, and I currently own 1 ukulele. I was looking for a new uke that is more portable yet still contains that classic ukulele look. Then I saw this one, I was stunned! I searched for a price but couldn’t find one. Is it for sale? Please get back to me as soon as possible! Thank you.
Not for sale, but you can download the instructions to build one!