Soprano Ukulele Kit

As many have stated here, it's a great kit. I agree. I also agree that you should take it slow. And do buy the video, it's money well spent. I built my kit in about 4 months, but it was my first time and I had never built an instrument before. Now I'm building from scratch and the things I learned during the building of the kit are serving me well.

I had a lot of fun, but highly recommend getting the video. The tension tuners were awful, and the strings not so good. Replaced these with geared tuners and real strings and it really improved the sound and playability. Had to lower the strings quite a bit. Great way to learn how to build a uke.

Very nice kit , if you have tools and common sense you'll do fine. You will need some other tools, that's just the way it is. If you build a second you won't need as much. The kit comes with all you need but not all you want. I'm personalizing mine with abalone on fret and neck, will try to do purfling and bindings. I want it to be very showy, plus I'm not in a hurry. It's the journey not the destination. If you ever wanted to build a stringed instrument this is a great kit.

todo perfecto llego a tiempo en perfecto estado, como lo acordado. un placer a ver comprado acá

Just finished my first music instrument which is the soprano kit with a bit of added bling and I'm thrilled with it. I used the kit for the complicated bits (that scare a first time builder like me ) such as the fret board and sides but customised it with a spruce sound board, paua purfling, mineritchi (Aussie Acacia) headstock overlay and bone nut and bridge. It is finished with truoil which was great to use. Very happy with how it turned out and am itching to get started on a scratch build but can't make up my mind if to make the sides and back out of wenge or mulga. A friend made the basic kit and the spruce adds a little bit of resonance and volume especially with Martin fluorocarbon strings. The DVD is worth the money. Go on, make one, you will love it.

I ordered and the kit arrived much faster than I thought it would. I started building the fixture (tool) to alighn the sides. I could not put it down. This was the most fun project to build. It has just the right amount of challenge to build a great Uke. I have since ordered parts to do a repair on an old Mandolin that got stored in an attic in Texas for many years. I love the fact that you can get the parts you want and they get them to you fast.
I make a suggestion (from one of my errors) check square of the blade on table saw before making the fixture. It needs to be real square, not 3 degrees off. (my oops)

Good kit. The DVD did not show finishing steps and also used a different method than one described in instructions.

Gday. Some little time ago I was having a ploinkle with my uke and decided I wanted something in mahogany or koa. One thing led to another and a mate of mine, John Copley, suggested I make one from a StewMac kit. He figured if I could make a longbow for hunting I could make a uke. He got me onto StewMac and I was really impressed with the value for money proposition and the quick turnaround - bearing in mind I am downunder. When the kit arrived I was really excited and I went round to John's place (he is a luthier with a full workshop that is full of StewMac stuff). In no time at all we had the sides in the jig and the neck and tail blocks gluing and the bracing on the top and the back. We also did the fingerboard and fretting. This was quickly followed by the kerfing (I used mandolin kerf not the stuff from the kit as I get around a lot to Festivals, including overseas and the mando kerfing from StewMac assures a stronger bond for travelling), then all the rest of the process. The instructions in the book were clear and easy to follow although I did have the advantage of the assistance of a full time luthier - so we did at times depart from the script. If you don't have access to a luthier who has made ukes - do what any good cook does and follow the recipe to the letter. Working a couple of nights per week I now have a great sounding and beautiful looking uke. This is a testament to the high quality materials provided by StewMac. I am definitely going to do another - a tenor and then have a crack at a mandolin.

I bought one for a friend that gave up after bracing back and top. So I ended up building the kit for him. It was fun even for an experienced instrument maker and - after adding some inlay and lining - it also looks good. But IMHO this uke it is somewhat overbuilt, does not sound that good as it is. It would be a good thing either to mention in the instruction book that the top and back can be made thinner before bracing or supplying thinner top and backs. It tooks a lot of sanding to fix this on the completed soundbox and it is not an easy work for the beginner. Sounds good after that. Also it would be advisable to find a better and easier way to join the neck to the body and align it. It is really too tricky getting decent results with the system suggested in the instruction manual.

This is the first instrument I have ever built. The kit comes with all the parts you need, however, as you should expect there are some tools required - there are some work arounds for suggested tools, but one luithier specific tool I recommend is a fret crowning file. After I leveled the frets a few of them were very flat and attempts at crowning with a regular file were damaging the finger board so I broke down and bought one and it did the job with ease. I had a lot of fun building this kit and learned a lot about instrument making. By the way if you take your time this uke when stringed with "aftermarket" strings has a much better and louder tone than a $99 store bought concert sized uke I bought a couple months ago. It's a fun project and you get a great instrument to play with when you are done.