(Tony's blue Tanglewood mid-way though the fretdressing and cleaning process)Today I rummaged around the house for some old classical guitar and mandolin tuners that had been left over from some repairs dad made to his instruments many years back , then cannibalized them for parts. I took a hacksaw to one set and liberated the worm gear and button for use in the completely knackered machinehead in Tony's guitar
(It's hardly an elegant solution but I'm not being paid enough to source a matching button, so he'll have to make do with a girly one for now.)
After that I did a little repair work for my own amusement - my mum found a tiny half size acoustic guitar with it's neck broken off, no strings and no machineheads. A little wood glue, some more parts liberated from the machineheads I found and whammy! I have a tiny guitar.
(it's only got four strings because the nut slots for the highest and lowest strings are buggered. The strings it has are tuned E-A-D-G, like a bass, and tuned to the same pitch as a guitar. Which gives the thing marvellously slack strings that can be bent and wobbled to my heart's content)Here's a shot of it with a normal sized classical acoustic and a 3/4 size classical acoustic to give you an idea of scale.
I'll give it back to the school at the end of the summer holidays but for now I think it's going to be my special barbecue guitar.
-Ben
