Homegrown Music and...Musical Instrument! The homegrown ""bonker box""

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To determine the lengths of the instrument's tongues, first find the center point of each parallel cut. You'll want to slice across the slit bordered bands at points that are slightly off center, and vary that "imbalance" from one pair of keys to the next. For example, if you separate one set of tongues at a point 1/4" from the center mark, you'll produce two keys . . . one of which will be half an inch longer than the other. (Or, if you make your cut 1/2" off center, the two tongues produced will be a full inch different in length.)

Depending upon the width of your box top and of its tongues, you may have either two or three sets of keys. In order for each notemaker to produce a different pitch, no two tongues should be of identical lengths . . . so your second cut will be farther off center than was the first separation, and so on.

Remember that the above tongue dimensions are no more than suggestions. You might, for example, actually tune the instrument by placing each cut to produce a specific note, but since the sound will vary from one piece of wood to another-it's impossible to describe a tuning "system". Such a precision drum would likely require the use of expensive, imported hardwoods . . . then its sequence of notes could probably be worked out according to a rough mathematical relationship between the lengths of the various tongues. But I find that oak-top drums with a random tuning are more percussive than "keyed" bonker boxes . . . and a whole lot more versatile.

With the tongues cut and shaped, it's time to rout or chisel a groove-1/4" to 1/2" wide and a little less than half the thickness of the wood in depth-on the underside of each key. Begin these grooves at a point even with the outer edges of the starter holes and work toward the tips of the tongues. The scoops will give the keys some additional freedom of movement, and will also affect the tuning of the drum. (You can raise the tone of a tongue by routing deeper beneath its tip, and lower the tone by increasing the depth of the groove at the base of the key.) Test your tuning -as you go-by holding the drum top near your ear and rapping the tongue in question with a knuckle.

Now cut your box's five other sides to size, and make sure all of your parts fit together snugly before applying yellow carpenter's glue to the joints. Then use large C-clamps, bar clamps, or pipe clamps to hold the assembly together while it dries.

Most (but not all) of the drums I've seen have had additional openings cut just below the joint between the sounding boards and the long sides. This slit frees the borders of the drum "head", allowing those areas to produce percussive tones of their own.

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