Cello

For the past two years I have been working on a few musical instruments. The first is an electric cello.

The neck and body are red oak (awful choice, but was all I could find at the time) which I shaped using a coping saw and some files in my college apartment. The body support struts are old aluminium tent poles so the whole thing disassembles quite easily.

The pickup is a magnetic coil hand wound with awg 40 magnet wire and rare earth magnets attached to screws for adjustably. this is the third pickup assembly the first was too quiet and lacked adjustably, The second included an active amplifier which ended up pumping out 3 volts of signal over whelming every amp or mixer it was plugged into the third was just right.

I was a little too cheap to spring for machine tuners at the time so I improvised with some bolts and wing-nuts that ride in groves to make a rather effective linear tuner that rarely goes out of tune.

I have given up on any attempt at aesthetics at this point in favour of pure functionality. I will try to be more artistic on the second model. (coming soonish)