Thanks, definitely better than it was as a guitar. An far as what I did, I'll issue the disclaimer that I am not very good working with my hands (building things that is...) but I have a creative mind. That being said, there are other people who have done this as well, and I got the idea from their youtube videos.
I pulled out the tuners, drilled the holes bigger (didn't have a big enough drill bit, so had to do some filing afterwards), used gb7 type tuners, 2 are upside down because I only had left side tuners, one broke while filing it for the e string to fit, but then I remembered I have a hipshot ultra lite that was removed from my birdsong to put on an extender key, so that's the e string tuner.
I bought a pickup on amazing for about $7, had to file the slot in the bridge to fit it, so that tailpiece is a little loose but I have a new on on order. I didn't put a preamp in this because it was just an experiment and I didn't want to risk cutting a large hole in it. It sounds good passive though, so I'm not worried, the tc seems to have a good input for the piezo pickup. I also bought the strings (Aquila thundergut) on amazon for $20.
I had to replac the guitar nut, and had a 1.5" precut nut, so it's too narrow, but I have one on order that should be long enough; in the meantime this will work.
Then I drilled holes in the body behind the bridge to give the strings a place to anchor. Getting the strings in and on was tricky, I had to fish it through the top and then maneuver it so I could reach it through the sound hole, then I could tie the knots and put the washer on. I would imagine the bass uke tuners would make this a little easier to restring.
Anyway, the guitar has been in our house for a few years and my kids never played it, so not including that, the total cost was less that $40. I'm surprised by how good it sounds honestly, so I'm going to guess one that is actually a bass uke is going to sound and play that much better. If I had actual woodworking skills and tools this probably would have taken about an hour. It took me basically the whole day and I'm sore right now, but it was worth it.
I going to bed, but I'll take a few photos with better lighting in the next couple of days and post them here.
And yes @pcake, the rondo one is what I will eventually get I think, the kala is out of my price range for now. I'm looking at the solid body one, which is $149. But we'll see, maybe I'll wind up digging the acoustic more. I should be able to use either one at gigs, and will definitely be recording with it.
