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Don't want to hijack the alternative neck wood thread, also do the odd thing that does not fit in other threads or deserves one of its own. Sort of a never ending story with no real direction planned.

Wanted to build a nylon guitar after throwing a bridge and strings on a guitar shaped object I built for my sister as she is an artist and gets requests for pieces to be auctioned off for charity. She has done a couple mosaic on beater guitars and since it is only meant to hang on a wall rather than being played I took some bodies I made and added a couple rough necks I made from some construction spruce.



Bodies were from my first build, while I was at it I bent and cut some extra sets to learn building. Moved beyond them so when sis asked if I had some guitars that did not work out and wanted to get rid of I completed these as far as she needed them to be.




Out of curiosity I bought a cheap bridge, frets and strings on EBay, when they came in I had other guitars on the go so I decided to grab one of her guitars and slap them on. Cheap thrills and little time involved.



High action as the neck was never built to have frets or strings on them. Not great but not horrible sounding, did a butcher neck set on it to bring the strings down. Around the same time I was researching torrification of wood, thought it might be feasible to do it at home, used some pine to experiment with. Decided to make an all Pine box with them, the sides broke when bending but the top and backs had a decent tap tone so I cut new sides and built them up. Also have been hanging out on a classical forum and decided to make the guitar Spanish style. The question now was what wood to use for the neck? Did not want to waste good wood on the project, I was planning on making a real nylon guitar but wanted to take my time on that one. I just wanted to build something that would tie me over with my nylon fetish until the real one was done. I saw a 2x3 that had promise so I cut it in two and glued it together to more or less counteract each other.



Roughed out neck and top.



After modifying the braces and adding sides.



Back on with ebonized Walnut fretboard.



No bindings to worry about since the guitar was not intended to have a long life. Back cracked while gluing up the braces, no big deal as the center strips will cover it.



A few coats of wipe on poly, collects less dust that way.



One place I did spend some time on was the neck, doesn't matter what it looks like but it is more enjoyable playing if you have a neck that feels nice.



And there you have it, with finishing and time off for good behavior while building, from start to finish about three weeks.



It is extremely light at just under 2 1/2 lbs. Small with a 13" lower bout and 16" body length, 22 3/4" scale length it is just fun to play. Sounds relatively decent, the back being the same wood as the front and about the same thickness makes for a lively sound. I do need to touch up the frets as they have not been dressed yet. Haven't had the heart to take off the strings since I put them on. Was asked about a truss rod, none to speak of. Was not suppose to be a long lived instrument, why bother. The problem is I fell in love with it.

So just a cheap simple build. Not the greatest highs or lows and is in no way a canon. Just something that you can effortlessly while away the hours with.

Any Guitar that you can effortlessly play for hours is a success Good job! I like the organic look. I'm inspired to try something similar. I wish I knew where I could get some spruce lumber!

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Pat

I like the idea, and looks like you had lots of fun with it.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

The wood for this came from Home Depot. I always took a walk through the lumber section whenever I was there and did a quick look through what they had. Rare to find 2x3's or 2x4's without knots all over. Wider lumber like 2x6's or 2x8's seem to be better stuff. The raw lumber picture there has quartered and flat sawn pieces that I was debating to use for the neck, went with the 2x3. One day I will try making one with just 3/4" material, I just thought it did not give much in thickness to play with. Would like to make a guitar out of a single board. Thinking of it as a starter project for regular wood working guys, figure once they make one they will be hooked and need to make more.

I plan on making a few more of these, picked up some Poplar for the neck and would do a simple rosette and binding though. Give the guitars a little more protection from getting dented. Thinking of making a couple out of Maple also, going out to see if I can find some today.

In a similar vein (quickly built cheap guitars) try using Formica for the back and sides. Most cabinet shops throw away scraps that are big enough to do this with. The resulting instrument is light weight, requires less finishing, and can be rather colorful. Martin has made a few this way (HPL guitars).