Acoustic/Electric Cigar Box Guitar

I'm 99% done with my first full-fledged cigar box guitar. It's an acoustic/electric. I used a piezo for the pickup. It's hot glued directly under the bridge and it works great. I made a ton of mistakes during the build, which means I learned a lot. I hope my failing mind retains this new found knowledge. 

Lessons learned: Measure twice more again. Take more off the back of the neck and round it out more. Do a scarf joint and angle the head back so the tuners are not in line with the fret board. Drill the fret marker holes in the fret board before gluing it to the neck. Be more patient with the file while smoothing out the ends of the frets. The slightest slip will mar the fret board. Measure three more times, dammit! 

I was pleasantly surprised at how well installing the frets went. Of course, using a template to mark the frets and a fret board miter box to cut the slots were the main contributors to my success. Filing down the rough ends was tedious and there were a few moments when I got too confident and the file slipped and ground away at the end of the wood instead. 

Things to do for the next one:  Add a brace for the neck. Do a scarf joint at the head. Improve upon the height settings for the nut, fret board, and bridge. Install a proper pickup.

The jack, volume control, and piezo.

 Chiseled some of the inside so the volume control would fit.

Kinda sloppy.