The Ukulady

Several years ago, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, I used a piece of black walnut butcher block to build a coffee table. The cutoffs from the legs, which were made out of dimensional 4x4 lumber, inspired me to start planning a project that would require steam bending. I quickly concluded, based on the sizes of the cutoffs and the anticipated complexity of larger projects, that a ukulele would be a nice place to start. Several months later, my daughter came home from school and mentioned that she had seen a music class from the students a year older than her playing "ukuladies" and that she wanted to learn to play one too. Well, my mind was made up that I simply needed to have a Ukulady and the planning began.

My design is actually pulled from a CAD drawing of a ukulele I found as a public document on Onshape.com. I have not been able to determine who the original designer was, but I scaled the shape on my computer screen and simply transferred it with a pencil to a sheet of white computer paper taped to the screen.

The inscription inside the ukulady reads "PERFECTLY IMPERFECT Handcrafted by Brandon J Winters" where the final "T" in Perfectly Imperfect was accidentally, but very appropriately, left as a smaller font size. This specific ukulele is designed to reflect the beauty of my best friend and love of my life, Katie. She is absolutely perfectly imperfect. The inscription on the back reads "Pure in life and love", which is also engraved on our wedding bands.

Building Jigs and Planning

Before starting the uke, I looked over a lot of online blogs and tutorials. I found those at Stewmac.com to be very helpful (How to Build a Ukulele Kit - StewMac) along with Building a ukulele (woodgears.ca) and Pat bending the ukulele sides (woodgears.ca).

To make the necessary cuts for the scarf join in the head, I made a quick jig that would provide a fence at the right angle.

Using some aspen 1x8 along with 1/2" plywood, and a scaled shape I downloaded from Onshape.com CAD software, I made a steam bending jig.

Using a stair tread several steel L-brackets, some steel hooks, and elastic cord, I made a jig for gluing the steamed body together.

Gluing and Shaping the Neck and Head

I found some small scrap pieces of spalted maple and roughly cut them the sizes needed for the neck. Once cut, I simply glued them together.

After gluing the neck, I started to shape the neck free-hand on the spindle sander. I made the scarf joint cut and glued the head to the neck.

Finally, I added a piece of white oak for the front face of the head.

Planing and Gluing the Front and Back

I found several pieces of quarter sawn white oak that had very pronounced medullary rays along with the visible color variation.

I resawed the 5/4 rough stock to get book-matched halves and then milled them down to roughly 1/4 inch thickness for gluing.

Once glued, I milled them down to 2 mm final thickness and cut them out slightly oversized using a scroll saw.

Steam Bending

After selecting a piece of white oak and cutting to dimension, I milled it to 2 mm thickness for steaming and bending. I found a lot of useful information here Building a ukulele (woodgears.ca) courtesy of Matthias Wandel.

I used a 3 inch galvanized duct along with two aluminum pop-can caps to build the steam chamber and placed the wood into the chamber for about 2 hours.

Once the wood was pliable, I fitted it into the steam form, clamped it shut and then with the clamps replaced with boards and screws, I baked it at 300 degrees Fahrenheit for 2 hours.

Kerfing and Bracing

I started gluing the body by adding bracing to the seam in the body behind where the neck would attach. I glued the seam first and then added the brace.

After adding this small piece of aspen, I used purchased kerfing along with the glue-up form and roughly 50 clothes pins to glue the kerfing to the inside perimeter of the body.

After adding the kerfing, it was time to glue braces onto the inside face of the front and back. I used a laser cutter/etcher to mark where the braces should go along with cutting the sound hole and adding the lettering and rosette.

Gluing the Body

I glued the back to the body first, using the glue-up form and elastic cord. The seam in the book matched face was aligned down the center of the body ensuring a small overhang of face beyond the edge of the body.

The overhang of the back face was cleaned up with a sanding wheel Dremel attachment before gluing the front following the same method as for the back.

After the front was glued, the edge was also cleaned up with the Dremel tool and then the body was lightly sanded with 220 grit abrasive paper.

Adding Binding

Using a special router bit I bought here Musicmakers (harpkit.com), I cut a rabbit around the perimeter of the top and bottom faces to receive the purchased binding. Musicmakers also sells binding, tuning machines, rosettes, fret wire, and much more. They do an excellent job, can not recommend highly enough!

The binding was wetted lightly with warm water before gluing and then painter's tape was used to hold the binding in place while the glue cured.

After the glue cured, the tape was removed and the excess dried clue was removed with abrasive paper.

Finishing the Neck

The "Ukulady" decal was added to the head with a laser engraver.

The same laser engraver was used to cut the fret slots in the black walnut fret board. I used the spreadsheet and calculator tool found here (Fret Calculator Tutorial | Electric Ukulele Land (ukeland.co.uk)) to get the correct fret spacing for the length of my scale.

After laser cutting and engraving, the fret board was cut to length and glued to the neck. The neck with fret board were cleaned up on the spindle and belt sanders to ensure straight lines and then the neck joint was fitted to the body.

Attaching the Neck and Fretting

I attached the finished neck to the body with glue and clamps. Painter's tape was used to limit excess glue on the body and avoid excessive sanding or scraping.

After attaching the neck, I used purchased medium fret wire and cut it to length with a side cutter. Then, using a small hammer and with the neck braced on top of a rolled up towel, I secured the frets in their slots.

The frets were finished with a metal file to remove burs from their ends and remove excess length. Holes were drilled for the tuning machines and the nut and saddle were glued on.

Finishing and Assembling

I finished the uke with one coat of Danish oil and then decided I wanted a glossy finish.

After drying for three days, I applied a spray-on waterborne spar urethane finish. I repeated the finish with a light sanding between coats.

Finally, I oiled the fret board with purchased oil and then added the tuning machines and fitted the strings. The string slots in the nut were added with a small triangular file.

All of the images above along with others that didn't make the cut and an early recording from this uke can be found below. They are organized into the same groupings as above but in alphabetical order so the first ones are "A", second "B", ... Enjoy!