if at first you dont succeed…

I recently had a student wanting to try making a ukulele in my grade 11 woodshop.   Knowing nothing about luthering or bending wood, I dove down the youtube rabbit hole  for some research and design.  A  staff member donated a rice cookr and I ended up building  a  chimney stack steam pipe.    I then tinkered for a week with bending attempts…  many failures led me to add insulation to the pipe and increase the duration I steamed the wood before attempting to bend.  .  I finally had a piece come out incredibly supple on Friday.   I had it in the form over the weekend. Below  is the final test and  some photos of the progressions and failures.

 

if at first you don’t succeed…

steam bending for a ukulele