Nut on A9's

[Baron Collins-Hill]

what is the material on a 2002 gibson a9. i hear they changed from plastic to bone: but when?

thanks
baron

[steve in tampa]

Corian

[Lane Pryce]

No its corian.A material that is used for counter tops and dishes.I had the corian nut changed on my 2002 F9 to bone and the improvement was very evident. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/mandosmiley.gif Lp

[Paul Weber]

hey Lane, what kind of improvement did you get with the new bone nut? I have a new F9 that I may change the nut on but my F9 sounds great right now.

Paul

[Lane Pryce]

Paul the tone was significantly deeper/woodier and there was more pop;the mandolin just woke up!The corian nut was poorly cut and the strings had dug into it;it was a real dog.Skip Kelly did the nut work.He posts here frequently.In his words"we have set this mandolin on fire!"I say change it,you'll be glad you did. Lp

[steve in tampa]

I have had 2 Corian nuts replaced w/ bone mostly because they were cut poorly. Never played them much before the replacement, just took them straight to the shop.

Have some friends who have done Corian countertops for years, and have played around with some of the scraps. It is a very dense and difficult to work with material, and will burn up the best power tools that are used to work on it in a short time.

[Jasper]

So, does anyone know what material is used on F5-Gs, -Ls, etc. for the nut? Is it corian or plastic or .....? I have an F5 and the nut appears to be plastic, but http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif?http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif?

[Lane Pryce]

Seems like I have read those are bone and special order mop.Maybe the specs are on the Gibson site. Lp

[Professor PT]

The only thing I hate about the one on my F-9 is that the edge is kind of sharp! They really need to finish those better; how long would it take to file it down? If Corian is that tough, I guess that's why they leave it like that.

[Philip Halcomb]

From what I understand the F9 come with bone nuts, the A9s come with corian, and the F5Gs are pearl. I replaced the nut on my F9 (whatever the material was) with a pearl nut. The open strings seems to boom a little more (to me that is) and rumor has that the pearl nut will last a lifetime. I say pearl is the way to go, 10 bucks for a blank from Stewart McDonald's...

[steve in tampa]

The nuts I replaced on 2 F9s (a 2002 and a 2003) were without a doubt Corian, and glued on at that. Been happy with the bone nuts. Don't really understand why the instruments came out of the factory with the goofy string spacing as they did, but I reckon it helped me get a better deal on them.
PT,it should be no problem to take a file to the sharp edges. Just take your time.

[Lane Pryce]

just a side note here.I listened to a guy playing an A9 last night that was outa this here world!!! http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/mandosmiley.gif Lp

[jim simpson]

I filed my A9's Corian nut to take off the sharp edge. The thing I was impressed with was the action was just right and no problem with the spacing. I don't know that I'm ready to change it out to bone, as it sounds so darn good already. I didn't realize pearl was used on the F5G. I didn't notice it on my F5G but I bought it used. I have had pearl nuts and installed my own made from blanks. Not easy to work with but not too bad. I would probably choose bone over pearl in most cases. One mando that I used to own did benefit from pearl as it lacked on the high end.

[Philip Halcomb]

I thought something was up with the original nut on my F9, the owner of the shop where I bought it said it was bone, so I guess I took his word for it. But when I knocked it out to install the pearl nut it crumbled all up and broke down into powder. So I thought it was funny. As for the pearl it is my understanding that everything from an F5G and up is pearl. With a possible exception of the signature models. That's now though, the older weber made F5Ls are obviously something else.