I wanted to polish up the hardware, but I was concerned about getting polishing compound residue everywhere. When it dries, it leaves white residue on stuff and it's sometimes hard to get it out of cracks, etc.
So I used masking tape around the lugs on the rim and then went at the lugs with my smaller polisher. Then I put the hooks on and polished them too.
Worked pretty well.
Funny picture though. When you use a wide-angle lens, the foreground looks a lot bigger than anything else - way out of scale. You'd think the polisher is twice the size of the peghead on the bench. It is not.
I thought it might be a good idea to use a bit of anti-sieze compound on the lug threads. Just a small amount should do it.
The anti-sieze is messy and tends to go everywhere. So I've been using gloves when I get near it.
Here I'm putting the nuts onto the lugs. You can see the head is already on the rim.
The new head installed onto the rim. I still have the original skin head, but I think the new head will work out better.
I procured a nice new bridge. If you look closely, you'll see that I filed the top into more of a nice curve. It came with the saddle sections cut squarely. I like to taper the saddle so that the string only contacts the bridge at one point - it prevents rattling.
Although on a banjo I think rattles are part of the game!
I'm going to put a bunch of coats of Tru-Oil on it. I don't like leaving raw wood on instruments, especially where the parts will be exposed to moisture and dirt.
We also need a new nut. I'm going to make one out of the small stash of buffalo bone I have. The old nut is in the foreground - I'll transfer its string spacing to the new nut.
The old one is plastic and we know bone is far superior for good tone.
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