Russell Johnson
Las Cruces, New Mexico, October 2000

Introduction

The neck gourd (tumba) on most modern sitars is not really a gourd at all, but rather spun wood or even sometimes painted aluminum! Spun wood or aluminum does not have the physical properties necessary to produce the desired acoustic amplification of sympathetic resonating tarab strings. Additionally, they are just too small to produce any sonic effect. However, to those who can hear the difference, a neck gourd of approximately 90% the size of the main body gourd and made of real vegetable gourd will reproduce and amplify the fugitive subtle frequencies of the tarab strings. Large tumbas are becoming impossible to find, so an alternative is to grow your own gourd to make your own custom neck tumba. I did it by "chopping up" the tiny aluminum tumba from my 30 year old sitar, and using parts from it and a large gourd I grew myself, created my own hybrid large tumba to replace the tiny one. Here's how it went:

Growing

I began the project of growing my own in late February of 1998, in medium hard Rio Grande alkaline adobe river soils here in Las Cruces, New Mexico.
At this point, I will also make appreciation to my 79 year old father for his help in my project.
The ground was still cold, but not frozen in this part of the country. I used the seeds I removed from a one-year aged Canteen gourd purchased from a local gourd artist at our farmer's market.
We drove several steel poles into the ground and strung 3 strands of heavy gauge barbed wire across the poles, enough to support up to an estimated 100 pounds of gourd and vine at any one spot (tight to keep it from sagging later).
We broke up the soil up to a foot deep using a shovel. One seed was planted every 1 and a half feet at a depth of 3 inches, up to 20 seeds planted altogether.
A soil retainer wall about 3 inches high was built around the seedbed. Once planted, the bed was watered heavily with a hose each day. No fertilizer was used.
The vines were tied to the barbed wire as they grew with strings, and the baby gourds were suspended from the wires as they grew.
As the gourds grew large, they were guided down onto a piece of dry board on the ground to keep them from getting wet and rotting, also to keep them from breaking the wire as they do get heavy.

In early November, a gourd was spotted with a diameter of about 10 inches and depth of about 6 inches and was picked; only one on the vine anywhere near that size. The gourd was stored as is in a warm, dry garage until January 1999. By then, the skin could be removed easily as it was ready.

Tool Time

Time constructing the new gourd was about one week. The old aluminum tumba was cut up with a hack saw, saving only the brass screw nut, neck and decorative top.
The top was particle wood and "leaves" was some sort of molded clay. These pieces would be grated onto the new gourd as they would be hard to build.
Had to be careful not to damage these pieces as they are small and fragile. This took one day.
The stem was cut off the new gourd, and medium sandpaper (200) was used to remove the skin and smooth the outside. It was wiped clean with a wet cloth and set aside to dry until the next day.

The third day, I used a pencil and drew a circle on the stem top. This would be where the salvaged parts from the old gourd would be mounted. A drill and bit was used to make a series of holes in the circle (not the best tool, but that's what I had).
Later, a small saw was used to finally cut out the hole. The hole is about 3 inches in diameter. A metal file was used to smooth the edges of the new hole and correct the circle.
The same process was done to the reverse side for the "sound hole". This has to be done slowly and took two days.

Finishing the above on the fourth day, a screwdriver was used to to pry out the "flesh" and seeds inside the gourd. By this time, the flesh was quite dry and came out easily with hundreds of large seeds.
Once again, medium sandpaper was used to smooth down the walls of the inside of the gourd. Wiped again with a wet cloth, set aside to dry one day.

On the fifth day, the gourd was sanded with fine sandpaper (100 or less) on the outside, wiped clean, and two coats of brown "Krylon" automotive lacquer-type spray paint were applied.
Dried for 2 hours. Two more coats applied and dried again. In the evening, two coats of a transparent medium-gloss acrylic polymer (used on bowling alleys) was brushed on the outside and allowed to dry. This put a very hard brown gloss on the gourd. Dried all night with the heat in the garage set to 70.

On the sixth day, I used "super glue" to mount the old top and neck into the pre-cut hole.
The bottom lip of the top must fit into the hole, while the outer ring of the top is the part glued to the new gourd. Holes or gaps were filled with "liquid wood" and carefully sprayed with Krylon to match the color of the gourd.
I used tape to protect and mask off any surface. The clay leaves were also glued on with super glue in the same pattern of the old gourd, radiating around the top piece.
The gourd was set aside bottom down with a heavy brick balanced on top of the brass screw until the glued parts settled and dried.

And on the seventh day, Russell rested.
In the afternoon, I took off the brick, screwed the new gourd into the hole on the back of my old sitar, and smiled as I played. Yes, it amplified not only the tarab harmonics, but also increased the midrange sound.
All this was almost 2 years ago now, and the gourd has traveled around a bit, but its all still holding together.
Of course, my old sitar will never sound as good as it did 30 years ago, but it still has life for a while longer.
A new problem cropped up as now my old case was too small to hold the "renovated" sitar, so I had to build a brand new larger case for it, but that's another story....