How to Make a Carved Wooden Lyre
- 1). Cut a section of hardwood 2 inches thick, using the jigsaw. Make it 1 foot long and 7 inches wide. Cut it more or less in in the shape of fish with no fins. At the "head" end of the piece, make the edge lopsided, with a point on one side and the edge descending, making the whole piece shorter as you go from left to right. The idea is to make a space for the strings to cross.
- 2). Mark out the hole for the lyre in the body of the piece, roughly trapezoid with a sloping top. Drill a hole through each corner and then cut from one hole to the next with the jigsaw.
- 3). Fix the piece in place, using a vice or clamps, depending on the orientation you are working at and the angle that is easiest for you. Always place scrap wood between the vice or clamp and the lyre to protect it.
- 4). Carve a shape of your choice into the tail of the lyre and refine the body of the instrument. Carve by positioning the chisel tip in the wood at a 45-degree angle with the bevel end of the chisel down. Gently strike the handle with the mallet; steadily decrease the angle of the chisel until it is nearly flat and smoothly slices the sliver of wood out from the lyre. Make slivers of no more than 1 inch.
- 5). Carve out a depression 1-inch deep in the tail of the wood. Start at the edge and carve to half way cross the tail. Sand the wood until smooth, using progressively finer grades sandpaper.
- 6). Cut grooves all the way around the end of the headpiece and sand until smooth. Make five grooves equidistant from each other. Drill five holes just smaller than the tuning pegs in the tail section of the lyre opposite the grooves and beside the depression. Gently hammer the tuning pegs into the holes.
- 7). Loop the guitar strings around the groove, tie in place and then loop into the tuning pegs. Tune until satisfied.
