Another week another stall

Second market stall happened this Saturday in East Dulwich. met loads of lovely people and lots of interest.

This week i had teeshirts, tea towels and bags for sale. If you want one please email me at flatfootjohnny@hotmail.com

Adult Tees: £20 (mens - M / L and womens - S / M)

Kids tees: £10 (S / M)

Teatowels: £7

Cotton bags :£5

 Ladies Tee in white (black also available)

Mens Tee in black (white also available)

100% cotton tea towel. Text reads: "Instructions for use: Fold teatowel into nice a nice tight bundle then stuff behind the head of your banjo... removes all traces of bluegrass twang!"

100% cotton tote bag

New regular market stall

I will be having a regular market in East Dulwich from this Saturday and then every (ish) Saturday. It will be on North Cross Road - just of Lordship lane - and i will be selling banjos and other handmade instruments. hopefully next week i will have some tee shirts too.

Harvester 4string CBG completed

4 String Harvester CBG

Mahogany neck, vintage Cigar box.

Carved heel.

Cigar box guitar heel carving

Heres my latest Cigarbox guitar commission.

Hello im still here

Just to let you know that I'm still here. No pictures to add at the mo... too busy with my day job (building the Tatlin Tower... google it). When i have the time i am working on one  mountain banjo (similar to the one I've already made), two tackhead grain measure banjos, two cigarbox guitars. I also need to dismantle and finish a steel (cookie tin) reso guitar and and a fretless banjo with head tensioners.... what else... oh yes! i have just bought a cute little parlour guitar, as cheap as chips, which im going to dismantle and restore - fitting a truss rod, some decent bracing and edge bindings. Ive cleaned up the gourd a grew last year and will hopefully start working on another gourd banjo soon(ish).

I think thats it for now except that im also designing myself a funky sideboard to fit my records in and still trying to find time to restore my old Humber... dunno how i find time for my day job... something will have to go!

bye for now... J

tin reso 4 string guitar

A quick vid of my latest build... not ye finished but just checking for sound quality... In the Pines by Lead Belly (and Nirvana)... and lots of bluegrass folks

Grain Measure Banjo modifications

After a few days of playing the ole grain measure banjo i decided to modify it for better playability. Ive added a walnut fingerboard to the neck and a brass section over the frailing scoop. Next is to take it apart again and french polish it. I will also, at some stage, be replacing the bracket shoes with some home made ones, these are from an old Circa 1880s 6 string fretless which i will eventually restore. I also aim to replace the friction tuners with planetry ones... when i have a spare bit of cash. A banjo similar to this (but not this one as its not for sale) will be around £700.

East Anglian Bluegrass festival

Heres a couple of pics from the EABF (hmm maybe ill try this as a tuning). Didn't take many because i lost the phone. Then found it a gain a couple of days later in the glove box of my car.

Playing my 1st grain measure banjo with head tensioners... it sounds real nice - loud and plunky.

Some folks jamming , the guys in the hats are members of the New Essex  Bluegrass Band.

Grain measure banjo - ready for the East Anglian Bluegrass festival

Heres my latest banjo. A "grain measure" banjo with fully hand made head-tensioning hardware, Ash neck, Victorian sieve pot, calf skin vellum, hand turned oak tuning pegs, ebony nut, Sapelle tailpiece. Put together temporarily so that i can take it to EABG fest at the weekend. When i get back it will be french polished and generally tarted up. As of writing this post the strings have only been on for an hour, so still need to settle in... but it sounds great - deep and surprisingly loud.

head fitted

Heres the skin and hardware stretched and fitted.

head skin fitting

Here's a pic of the skin, still wet, fitted to the banjo pot. Next time i'll leave more around the edges... a lot easier to tighten.

Stall at the Deadbeats Frenzy

Some pics of my 1st stall at this years Deadbeats Frenzy.

Dan (Union Canal String Band) on bass.

 Angus + Wilma

Tackhead banjo progress

Heres the neck fitted to my latest tackhead grain measure banjo.

and here it is after the heads been tacked on.

tensioning hardware

 Tensioning brackets under construction

Soldered together

tapping the hook nut threads

Trial fitting onto pot

canjo commision completed

Latest canjo commission completed and now residing with it new owner.   

Golden Syrup Canjo

Current canjo commission in its final stages.

More hook nuts

More hook nuts... better this time.

Dont try this at home folks

In order to save time and effort in carving the radius for the join between neck and pot i decided to build myself a drum sander, using a router mounted upside down onto a work bench.

Unfortunately something went amiss and as soon as i switched it on the drum shot out and hit me clean between the eyes.

This photo was taken just after i stemmed the flow of blood...

and just before the swelling began making me look like Davros

With aching head and blurry vision i set too to have another go. This time setting the router to its slowest setting... all seemed good for about 10 seconds then it started speeding up of its own accord to full speed causing Davros to panic and run for the plug... Thanks for the cheap as chips Aldi router... i should have known better.

Hand made Hook Nuts

Today i made some hook nuts. Turned them from some 8mm hex bar. I'm quite pleased with them but i feel they could be better. So im gonna make some more.

Neck hole drilling jig

Heres a jig i made to fit onto my lathe so that i can drill dowel rod holes in necks. Its a bit Heath Robinson and will probably be adapted as i use it more but works pretty good so far.

rough cut necks

The 5 instruments im working on at the moment. From left to right. Canjo for Tom, 'A' scale grain measure tack head banjo, 'G' scale tack head grain measure banjo, 'G' scale grain measure banjo (with tensioning hardware) 4 string steel reso guitar.

the Ballad Of Wilma (a musical interlude)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8UX5to9iEs
Heres a song i wrote about my custom Humber Hawk... 

I got an old Humber and her name is Wilma
And everybody knows that she helps me fill my
Boots, oh man you gotta hear her roar.

She uses to much petrol and the oil leaks from her
Her paintworks chipped she got a shifter from a Comma
Van and you know there's rust coming through the doors.

Oh Wilma wont you get me home
Oh Wilma
Wont stop playin up and get me and my baby home.

She's a station wagon with a matt black paintjob
A custom grill and a noisy gearbox
And when it rains the water drips to the floor

Rear lights a from a caddy yes fifty-niner
The chromes not bad but it could be finer
There's plenty of room out back and you know what for...

Oh Wilma wont you get me home
Oh Wilma
I wish you'd just stop stoppin and get me and my baby home

home grown gourd

Here is my 1st home grown gourd, Currently drying out and looking pretty scary. Apparently its manky appearance is quite normal at this stage.

Its a bit smaller than the ones ive previously used. but should be O.K. Lets hope it survives the summer then i'll start building in the autumn.

Grain measure banjo build

From the two vintage sieves i have made three banjo hoops and reinforced them so that the tight heads dont cause the pots to crack.

 

Two of the banjos will be tackheads and one will have hand made tensioners.

This is an image of a rolled steel reinforcing band which fits around the bottom of one of the pots. Its fastened together with copper rivets. This will be the same method i will use for making the tensioning hoop and they will both be soaked in salty water for a few weeks to corrode and age. Im thinking of making this banjo look antique and well used... inspired by a project by the banjo maker Dan Knowles (see the Banjo Hangout). Next is to find some timber for the necks - Two banjos will be G scale and one will be the shorter A scale, all fretless (one might have fret markers)

gourd banjo complete and new things begining

"Gourd on the Vine" is now complete and i will hopefully be getting some vids of it on Youtube soon.

I'm half way through building a steel guitar made form a Quality street tin. Its going to be four string with spun steel internal resonator inside. I've beaten out the lid to give it a domed back and to remove the heavily embossed  Quality Street logo and Ive sanded off the paint and gone at it with a wire wheel to give it that antique steel guitar look (check out Kent Duchaines' "Lead Bessie"). The neck is Oak, with an Iroku fret plate.

I found this really great "Train Master" cigarbox and will be starting this once I get some more neck timber. I already have an idea in my head for some cool railway inspired carving.

I recently got very excited in an antique shop when i found these great antique wooden sieves. One is 9" diameter x 3.5" the other is 10" diameter x 5" and will make 3 fantastic grain measure banjos. Im especially excited about this because my 1 successfully grown gourd will probably take another 6 months or so to season (so long as it doesn't rot) and my recent attempts at bending some walnut for my next banjo ended in disaster and three lengths of wasted timber.