Copper Pot Banjo Project

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Posted by TD_Frailin on Thursday, December 6, 2012

Well, I just finished up my first homemade banjo project and I figured that since I haven't really done the whole blogging thing yet, perhaps this would be a good place to start. I've enjoyed reading through other folks' blogs about building instruments, so why not share my own?

This all started off when I found an old copper ice bucket while digging around in my folk's storage space. It was one of those items my mom sort-of pushed on me to help reduce some of the clutter in the loft of their garage. At first I thought I'd use it for what it was intended for - a neat looking ice bucket for making cocktails. It had cool little penguins pressed in the metal around the top and it seemed well built. Plus you just don't see many people using ice buckets up in these parts, so I thought that if anything, it'd make an interesting conversation piece. However, I never did fill it with ice. After a while I simply grew tired of looking at it and I soon started to ponder what else I might be able to do with it. I knew I couldn't throw it in the trash - it was way too cool of a piece!

This was around the time I was really into Adam Hurt's gourd banjo CD, Earth Tones. I had been researching various blogs about building gourd banjos and came across some YouTube videos of gas can banjos, cookie tin banjos, and other homemade banjo-like instruments. That's when it hit me . . . I should use that copper ice bucket as the pot of a banjo!

I was soon obsessing over how I'd go about making this unique instrument. I checked out more of those banjo-building blogs, more YouTube videos, and spent time sketching ideas for designs in my notebook. The first thing I decided I'd need was a good supply of lumber. So, one thing led to another and while I was making a run into town for groceries, I came across a local guy selling a 7' long, ~18-20" wide, 3" thick slab of rough-cut maple at a yard sale for $20. I gave it quick once over, paid for it, and loaded it into my Tacoma.

When I made it home I decided to use my latest banjo neck sketch, based on my old open-back banjo neck, as a template. First I had to cut out the neck blank. For this I fired up the little Husqvarna chain-saw and quickly sawed a rough neck blank.

Then I sketched the basic outline of the neck on the neck blank. I arranged to head over to a friend's workshop in order to use his bandsaw to cut out the neck shape. But, I gave it a second thought and decided that 1.) it wasn't worth the gas money to drive all the way over there and back just to use the band saw for 10 minutes and 2.) I'd try to limit my use of electric/power tools for the remainder of the project (hahaha - spoiler alert: that didn't last long). I ended up using a hand saw to cut the basic shape of the neck, and then used a draw blade to roughly shape the remainder. It took a full afternoon, but everything worked out nicely. By the end of the day I had a roughly shaped neck with an uneven and rough-looking fingerboard. To fix the fingerboard problem, I tacked the neck nice and level onto a long board and ran it through the electric planer. Badda-bing, in 5 minutes I had a nice level and smooth fingerboard. So yes, I cheated a bit on that part.

Over the next couple of afternoons I finished shaping the headstock and started sanding the neck. I also ordered a tapered reamer to use for the tuner peg holes. It felt great to get this project off to such a productive start! I started shaping the base of the neck so that it would fit nicely against the pot, and started to think a little bit about how it would all fit together. The next step involved forming a dowel that would run through the copper pot and into the base of the neck. This was fairly easy to carve using one of the scrap pieces that was formed while sawing out the shape of the neck from the neck blank. I used an electric drill to auger out a hole in the base of the neck for the dowel, and sanded the dowel down so that it would fit nice and snug into the neck.

At this point, it was starting to look like a real instrument, and I was really excited about it. The excitement was short-lived because I realized that I had no idea what I was going to use as a head on the copper pot. I brainstormed for a while and came up with plenty of ideas: use the inverted copper lid and make a resonator-like banjo; place a wooden hoop up under the copper pot rim and drill holes around the top so I could tack a skin head to it; use the cover of a cookie tin; use a piece of sturdy cardboard . . . but none of the ideas really seemed ideal. At one point I thought I would look for a toy drum with a similar diameter head and just cut the head off of the drum. But, I searched and searched, and found nothing within my budget (which was minimal). So, I put the whole project on the back burner for a while as my work field season approached and I became too busy for this new 'hobby project'.

While I was conducting field work in the Apostle Islands I had a lot of time to think about additional possible remedies for the head of the copper pot banjo. I knew I was on the right track with the toy drum idea, so when I returned to the mainland I jumped into the interweb and found a cheap tambourine with the exact diameter I needed to fit into the top of the copper pot. It was under $7 and included free shipping! I immediately ordered it and waited very impatiently for its arrival. The website on which I found the tambourine did not give much of a description, so I assumed it was going to be a cheap plastic head. However, when it arrived, it was a nice tacked skin head. I rushed home, made a few measurements, cut the head off the tambourine and placed it into the copper pot - it fit like a glove. Problem solved!

I then spent the next few afternoons sanding, forming, sanding, carving, sanding, . . . until I had the neck completed (sans the 5th string peg/peg hole) as well as 4 tuning pegs carved to fit the reamed peg holes. I also made a crude tailpiece which slipped over the end of the dowel stick.

Much to my surprise and satisfaction, everything aligned fairly well. I had to shave a little bit more off the lower section of where the neck butted up to the pot just to get the action of the strings at a comfortable position. Also, I took a little bit of solid brass and cut a piece wide enough to use as a nut. I filed a place for the nut to fit on the neck and then filed guides for the strings into the nut. It was getting close to finished.

I used Minwax Antique Oil Finish on the neck and hand-carved tuning pegs. Then I scrapped the old clunky tailpiece I had carved and proceeded to carve and finish a smaller design I had seen in some minstrel and gourd banjo blogs. Finally, I used Aquila Nylgut strings and strung it up. At first I used an old minstrel banjo bridge, but it placed the strings far to close to one another, so I swapped it out with an improved modern bridge. I think I'm going to try to hand carve some additional bridges. I need the practice for future projects anyway.

Here is how the banjo has turned out so far. (I'm still trying to decide if/when I'm going to add the 5th string.)

I'm fairly happy with how it turned out. It has a unique tone - sort of like a cross between a cookie-tin banjo and a gourd banjo. I'm digging it so far. I've posted a couple of recordings on my Soundcloud page:

https://soundcloud.com/travis-bartnick/soldiers-joy-on-the-copper-pot .

https://soundcloud.com/travis-bartnick/hop-high-my-lulu-gal-copper

I'm planning on building a wooden salad bowl banjo and a couple of gourd banjos over the winter so stay tuned.

7 comments on “Copper Pot Banjo Project”

monchan Says:
Friday, December 7, 2012 @5:43:44 AM

You are great!
After read your blog, I thought that I will try like this making someday.

mike gregory Says:
Friday, December 7, 2012 @7:08:34 AM

Well done! And, with a little care, a hundred years from now, it will STILL look good and sound good.

Charley Says:
Friday, December 7, 2012 @4:11:02 PM

That is a beautiful-looking instrument with a really charming sound (thanks for sharing the recording of it). The only issue is that I'm going to end up spending the next year thinking of everything I see in terms of "could I make a banjo out of that?"