Back to the banjo

[Bikewer]

Some years ago, when I was building a lot of cigar-box instruments, I decided to make a banjo.
I had intended to go full-bore and make a skin-head banjo with the dual hoops and fabricated tensioners and all that.
The more I played around with the idea the more difficult it became...

Then I was surfing YouTube for ideas and found a page by a commercial outfit called “Backporch Banjos” (since out of business). These guys were making a very inexpensive instrument using a piece of industrial-cardboard concrete forms for the rim, and a plywood top.
Thing sounded surprisingly banjo-y...

So I built my own, using a section of PVC sewer drain for the rim and 1/8” Baltic Birch plywood for the top:

https://www.cigarboxnation.com/photo...o?context=user


I painted the ugly PVC and made the neck using the dimensions for a classic Gibson banjo I found online.

I’d originally planned to learn frailing/clawhammer style, but after fooling with it for some months it just wasn’t working and the instrument has been sitting there for some time.
But recently I picked it up again and stuck on some fingerpicks and found I was actually pretty fluid with the Scruggs-style “rolls” (I play a lot of fingerstyle guitar) and it’s quite fun to play!

[BillRomansky]

Way to go! Banjos are like the Willys Jeep of musical instruments. I assume you’re using steel strings (versus nylon)? I made one out of a wooden bowl and an old raw matched guitar top laying around.