Classic battery-less passive electronics.
This twelver is a mashup of a number of different models. The body is Danelectro-style masonite over chambered plywood, with Tolex binding. The headstock is interleaved Rickenbacker, the bridge is more like a Gibson, while the overall style is my typical Audiovox.
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This was my first Audiovox project. Below is the original walnut body, fairly true to the original. My goal was to build the closest possible reproduction of the original Tutmarc Audiovox with modern parts. The ergonomics were very bad, much like a Steinberger. The headstock geometry is also not great, you can see how two of the tuners are reversed to make it work. These are expensive Gotoh tuners that are tight enough to work in reverse; I wouldn't try this with Chinese cheapies.
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This one is a body-twin to the 12-string, but with a 30" bass neck. Everything about it is Danelectro - lipstick pickups wired in series, stacked controls, masonite pickguard, Danelectro bridge. The body is masonite over chambered plywood, oil-based poly over pearl paint.
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This body is maple plywood over a hollow pine core, double-bound. It came out very lightweight, too light to balance even a guitar neck. This was originally going to be the 12-string, but I realized that it would never balance. So I shuffled parts and bodies between some other projects - a planned six-string got canceled and became the twelver. That left this body free. I thought about it a while and decided it would make a good mandolin.
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Together with the guitar, this was the first of my modified Audiovox design to be completed. Solid poplar bodies, stained to look like walnut, with single bindings. Each pickguard used an entire sheet of material; only these two got the pearl treatment, the rest got much less expensive masonite pickguards.
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This was the first of my modified Audiovox design to be completed. Solid poplar bodies, stained to look like walnut, with single bindings. Each pickguard used an entire sheet of material; only these two got the pearl treatment, the rest got much less expensive masonite pickguards.
More: Audiovox Solid-Body Guitar ...
This one was a testbed for the Radiata glue-up body construction. I had lots of Strat hardware lying around from all the bass projects, so I decided to use some of it. As usual for my guitars, this has a fixed steel truss rod. This is the last of my Audiovoxes, and probably my favorite.
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These are the two main templates I used to build all the Audiovoxen. The image is straight from the camera, simply save it and print it out at the proper scale. The dimensions of the body template are 17" long and 11-1/2" wide. The overall length of the headstock template is 10-7/8". The neck pocket is Fender-standard.
This is my own original design, it is inspired by the old Audiovox, but not copied from it. My original design was an accurate copy, and it didn't work very well. Therefore, nothing needs to be exact if you want to build one of these, there are no official factory specifications.
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This is probably the cheapest violin bass on earth, and I got a discount on top of that because it had a persistent buzz that turned out to be a bad string. "Brownsville" is a house brand for Sam Ash, where I bought it on a whim. The scale is about 30.5". It's a beauty, isn't it?
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This body style was originally reissued in a range of models - guitar, bass ( long and short scale ) and baritone. I only have the guitar. These were part of Danelectro's Chinese production, and while not bad, are not as nice as the prior or later Korean models. A second reissue in 2015 restored the gloss sparkly finish of the vintage original. None of the reissues use the original headstock shape, though.
More: Danelectro '63 (1457) Guitar ...