December 2009 Blog Posts (5)

Gluing on purfling to the streichzither

The clamps are a little heavy handed...the blue tape works fine, but i needed a few clamps to get things started. I used the hot pipe to pre-bend the purfling to rough shape.

Note the spruce patches to the longitudinal center brace. They are to replace material that was lost during removal of the back, and will be… Continue

Added by Mark Riess on December 23, 2009 at 9:01pm — No Comments

Bouzouki restoration

I've been restoring this instrument I made some 34 years ago. It started out with 4 strings and tapered violin pegs, but about 4 years ago I really wanted a bouzouki, and since I couldn't afford one, I decided to convert this (I used to call it a) dulcilyn....kind of a combo between a dulcimer and a mandolin. I…

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Added by Mark Riess on December 23, 2009 at 8:30pm — No Comments

Restoring the streichzither

Adding a spruce brace to the back to flatten it out.

mixing rosewood sawdust and clear epoxy to fill some voids on the top.

The top with voids filled...…

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Added by Mark Riess on December 18, 2009 at 7:11pm — No Comments

Have you ever seen something like this, or do you know what it is?

My father-in-law gave this to me back in the 80's, and I never had time to do much with it. It was in extreme disrepair at the time, but he recognized it as a unique and lovely piece of work. I don't know where he got it. Probably in a second hand shop of antiques up in the gold country between excursions prospecting or treasure hunting. I certainly think he found a treasure in this.

But, try as I might, I've been unable to find anything similar,… Continue

Added by Mark Riess on December 6, 2009 at 3:37pm — No Comments