So glad I can finally share this one. It was a Christmas gift so I didn’t want to post about it until after I gave it to my daughter. Long story short, I really wanted to come up with a unique gift for each of my daughters that was made by me. I racked my brain and finally came up with this. My daughter loves music and I love to listen to her so I made her a new foldable ukulele. (That way she can bring it back to school with her without having to worry about breaking it on the plane…besides its just so cool). I found a pattern online and made some minor updates for the material and the GlowForge and magic…a wonderful Christmas gift.
This one is made out of proof grade mdf and as you can see in the video, it sounds pretty good.
Funny note. when I finished it, I tried stringing it and of course it didn’t sound right and I couldn’t tune it. Gave it to my daughter and she thought it sounded odd too. Then she figured out I put the strings on backwards. When she played it upside down, it sounded great. The video is after we put the strings in the right place. If she really enjoys it, we may make another one out of nicer woods, but for now, she really liked the mdf, it is different from the other ones I have bought her. And she can decorate it.
That’s awesome! Are you going to sell the pattern? Or point us to the pattern you used. This would make the perfect gift for the ukelele fanatic in my life!
The OP mentioned finding a pattern online that they tweaked a bit for the GF. Probably a path easy enough to follow using the end result pictures as a guide.
Likely could do something similar with other instruments like banjos & guitars. The traveling versions of those tend to be fairly expensive.
I can’t give the my designs because I don’t fee the are mine to give. I am always happy to share what I can, but if my design is based on someone else’s. I try and respect their work.
I love a community that shares and honestly it is my favorite part of the glowforge, all of you!
So I do think it is fair to share the link where I started since it is a public link and you can get the starting design there.
I will say, be careful adjusting the design, obviously one of the key needs is that the proportions stay the same so that the tuning and the frets work as the instrument plays correctly.
I agree it is why I put it here, I am not offended by the ask and certainly understood based on the follow up note. Thanks for keeping the spirit of the forum in mind.
Should help folks with limited Google-fu and certainly not reason for anyone to get their shorts in a twist.
There’s a pretty decent reservoir of knowledge out there on making travel-friendly instruments (I’ve known Scouts who carried guitars on an 12-day back-country Philmont backpacking trek). Making them foldable and laserable or CNC cuttable has been picking up momentum.
Instrucables has had some intriguing attempts and I’m convinced the foldables at full or near full size are better than some of the shrunken instruments in terms of sound quality.
I’ve looked at this design, and it’s reasonably priced and looks like it would be a lot of fun. My only reservations were that it called for larger pieces than the GF can handle…hence the tweaks mentioned above. I’m not sure I’m up for that yet, but it’s on my short list! @neteeyore, this is so awesome! My uke playing daughter is already bugging me to give this a try…
Yes, the size of the original was one of the issues I faced. I had to modify the design to fit on materials the GlowForge could handle. I also had to deal with issues like the exact thickness of material and for the doll rods, I really didn’t want to leave it just friction fit so I designed some ends for the doll rod pins. it took a bit of work and I made some mistakes. I actually printed most of it three times before I got it right, but some of that is my issues with Aphantasia. While it was some work, it was really enjoyable and my daughter loved it. I was also extremely pleased with the way it sounded. Obviously I did mine for my daughter as well so I am right there with you.
