regraduating a vintage gibson

**John Rosett** · Mar-25-2005, 12:44pm

i was wondering if anyboby here has taken apart and regraduated a prewar gibson A style (with F holes). i like the way the 30's A mandolins look and feel, but most of them don't have alot of tone. i know about randy wood redoing sam bush's 30's F5, but what about an A?
# # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # john

**timothy.c.hicks** · Mar-25-2005, 12:52pm

John Monteleone also regraduated Mike Marshall's Loar. There was agreement that the sounds was greatly enhanced.

**John Rosett** · Mar-27-2005, 7:14pm

anybody?

**Jonathan Reinhardt** · Mar-27-2005, 8:15pm

Does the tone lack sufficiently to warrant this? What model? 30s and early 40s A's get a bad rap what with all the other wonderful Gibsons out there, but my experience is that more rather than less have a quality sound (if they were higher end models). It may not be the sound of a 20's F, or an earlier oval hole A, or of the instruments currently being made, but it is a sound that has more merit than it is given credit for.
My opinion is that musicians like Sam Bush may need to have instruments adjusted at this level of seriousness, but many of us do not.
I go thru this kind of questioning from time to time with my early 40's A, f-hole. I ask myself "Is it really a worthy performer, or is it just me and my own naivete?" I come back to it time and time again to do things that can't be done on other instruments. I am always rewarded with good results. I leave it as is, other than maintenance.

rasa

**sunburst** · Mar-27-2005, 9:41pm

First, the answer to the question: No, I haven't re-graduated any 30s F-hole A mandolins.

Do you have one, or do you have one in mind? If so, have you measured the thicknesses? Not all 30s Gibson mandolins are over built.
I've measured 30s F5s that were pretty thin. I don't know much about the A styles from that time period, but I'd measure the thicknesses before thinking about any re-graduation.

**onlyagibsonisgoodenuff** · Mar-27-2005, 9:43pm

I think the general consensus is that this type of work would be more money than the mandolin would be worth. Or very close to it. Now the old F5's would be a different story.

**John Rosett** · Mar-27-2005, 10:35pm

thanks for the replies. i'm just curious about this-i'm not planning on doing doing it at this time.
i love the way those old prewar A style mandos look and feel, but i've never played one that i really liked, tone wise. maybe i've never played the right one.
john

**Michael Lewis** · Mar-28-2005, 1:18am

With all the great mandolins out there why alter a vintage one? Once it is changed history is written. Now, if you have a badly damaged mandolin the situation is somewhat different. But just remember what Charlie Derrington did with Ol' Bill's F5. Just go find one that lights your fire and buy it, and leave the original ones the way they are.

**AlanN** · Mar-28-2005, 5:46am

Back when there were far fewer choices (read: none), Doyle Lawson with the Country Gentlemen had an A-50 conversion done. I think it entailed a longer neck, thinned tone bars and top. It sounded ok after that, on record.

**mikeyes** · Mar-28-2005, 2:55pm

And Randy Wood did at least 13 A-50 to A-5 conversions which involved regraduation. In those days (early '70s) we didn't have the great mandolins around that we have now.