Many banjos have a neck heel that fits to the shape of the outside of the rim. Then, the neck is fastened onto the rim using a dowel stick, a neck brace, and an endpin. Like this:

Several years ago, while researching gourd banjos, I ran across some pictures of the haitian banza and other gourd instruments that got me thinking about how the neck connects to the hoop or gourd. I saw a few examples of instruments that did not use a fitted neck heel. Instead, they used a tapered dowel stick that the gourd fit onto. After a few months of daydreaming on the idea, I gave it a try. Turns out it worked alright!

In the first iterations of this design I used a single long piece of wood for the neck and stick. It takes a pretty good chunk of wood to do that! Later, I started experimenting with making a glue joint between the neck and stick. The joint is pretty much flat except that the mating surface of the stick has a three degree angle, which tilts the neck back from the stick just a little.

I’ve found that this banjo design holds up well to string tension and I’ve tested it on a variety of banjo build styles for several years now. They are still playing and staying in tune.