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New Eric DeVine tenitone uke build
Hi all,
I posted an unscientific survey 10 days ago to see if folks would welcome a "tenitone" uke (midway between a tenor and a baritone) build thread, or would descend on the Custom Shop with pitch forks. It seemed that folks were encouraging of a really small guitar build thread, so here we go! The basics: Eric is a well-respected maker of ukuleles and guitars based in Maui who does really beautiful work. He is doing a small batch of tenitone ukuleles right now, including one for me, so I have asked him to post all of them because we are all gluttons for more beatiful build pics. My ukulele will be Carpathian spruce top and Cuban mahogany (grown in Hawaii) back and sides. Jamie Last edited by Kerbie; 03-02-2019 at 04:19 PM. Reason: Edited detail |
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#3
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I have been waiting here excited to see the build, as I am free forming a concert sized Uke as a skill building warm up to my next 2 guitars...
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First pic
Here is a first photo of the rosette Eric designed for my uke, in stone and abalone. I am working on getting more photos.
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Wow! Beautiful rosette. Looking forward to the rest of the build.
__________________
Life is like a box of chocolates .... |
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OK, here we go. As I crudely narrate this story, I hope Eric chimes in with his vastly more knowledgeable perspective.
This is the set of Hawaii-grown Cuban mahogany Eric is using. Eric loves this stuff, says it is denser than koa and it has a tone closer to rosewood than mahogany. I think it is purty. |
#7
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Eric says the Cuban mahogany ages to a beautiful reddish brown, as you can see from this uke Eric built a few years ago.
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My "tenitone" uke is one of a batch of four that Eric is working on right now. Here are the backs, the two darker ones being BRW of course. Not sure what the fourth is: koa? Eric reportedly has a great collection of koa.
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Here are the tops for this batch: my Carpathian (with the rosette overlaid)
, one beautiful set of redwood, and two other spruce tops (I will ask). |
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I love what Eric is doing with the backstrip on this uke. I imagine it is intended to be lava, or at least I like thinking of it that way.
By the way, Hawaii has had an intense year! Major volcanic eruption on the Big Island, 50 inches of rain in 24 hours last month on Maui (most ever), and the lowest elevation snowfall (6,000 feet I think) ever also last month on Maui. Crazy. |
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Oops, here is the photo of the "lava" backstrip:
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One of the two unidentified spruce tops is bearclaw Swiss spruce. Eric backlit the top on one of these photos to show the bearclaw, the other photo highlights the rosette he is using for that one.
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What scale length will this be? I had my Mya Moe baritone uke 20" scale length neck converted to a 19" scale length neck to permit high tenor C tuning which won't work on 20" scale length. 19" has more fret spacing which makes playing up the neck lots easier than 17" tenor. What a great mod! It's my favorite uke now--so much more volume and sustain than my 17" tenor ukes.
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Scott McNeill 000 cutaway, hog/spruce Martin 00-18 custom shop cutaway Martin 000-Jr-10E cutaway Minerva 0 12 fret Edwinson Falcon 0 cutaway, sapele/spruce Edwinson Zephyr 00 cutaway, koa/spruce Taylor 612-C Maple Grand Concert (1997) Taylor 612-CE Maple Grand Concert (1999) |
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Quote:
"It is a perfect halfway between a Tenor and a Baritone but with the standard GCEA tuning. It bridges the gap between the two for people that want more sound and a longer scale but want to retail the GCEA tuning and string tension... Baritone body length 14" Tenitone body length 13” Tenor body length 12” Baritone Scale length 19.75” Tenitone Scale length 18.6” Tenor Scale length 17" The Tenitone uses a set of Baritone GCEA strings made by Aquila that I have used before on baritones but found them to be too high tension for that scale. Fortunately they work perfectly for the 18.6 scale and maintain the same string tension as a tenor. The Tenitone is definitely a bigger more powerful sounding instrument than the Tenor is. Almost everyone that picked it up and played didn’t realize that it was not a Tenor as it remains very balanced and is not oversized like a Baritone, they just thought it was very comfortable huge sounding Tenor. I also gave the fingerboard just a little extra room on the width to improve playability." |
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Quote:
__________________
Scott McNeill 000 cutaway, hog/spruce Martin 00-18 custom shop cutaway Martin 000-Jr-10E cutaway Minerva 0 12 fret Edwinson Falcon 0 cutaway, sapele/spruce Edwinson Zephyr 00 cutaway, koa/spruce Taylor 612-C Maple Grand Concert (1997) Taylor 612-CE Maple Grand Concert (1999) |