Mar 8, 2009

Another Dulcimer Finished...


You may recall that our friend Macie Rorabaugh visited us the week after Christmas. Macie and I started building a curly maple and walnut dulcimer for her that week, and she designed the sound holes which we cut before she left to return to Iowa. As I completed the dulcimer I ran into a few problems.


First I discovered that the fretboard, which I had bought on eBay a l-o-o-o-ng time ago, was warped and couldn't be used. I bought some new walnut and adapted the body of the dulcimer to accommodate the new piece. Then I decided to change from tapered violin-style tuning pins to geared tuners. I bought the tuners from Stewart-Macdonald only to discover that the side walls of the peghead were too thin for the tuners. So I built a doubler plate that follows the curvature of the peghead. I finally finished the instrument this week and it sounds wonderful!


It will be leaving for Iowa soon.

3 comments:

Sue said...

Beautiful!!! I get so many compliments on mine when friends come over - its such a gorgeous instrument and I love to play it.

Anonymous said...

That is one sweet looking dulcimer!

james kahrs said...
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