I had some time this evening to get some pictures of the new mandolin I got off eBay a few weeks back. This model has been mentioned in a few topics including one that I started myself when I first started thinking about taking a chance on it:
http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/sh...s-from-Houston
http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/sh...stery-Mandolin
http://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/sh...in-hand-carved
Just to summarize, it really did turn out to be an all-solid carved mandolin with a proper scroll and points and some decently figured wood. I felt like I was taking a bit of a gamble on it, but the seller has reasonable feedback and a good return policy if it turned out to be a total disaster. What really pushed me to roll the dice was seeing picture of a recent Kentucky KM-650 F Artist. Please tell me you see anything not suggesting that this is the same mandolin minus the branding. I haven't.
The biggest issue with it was that the bridge had a radiused saddle while the fretboard's dead flat. As a quick fix, I swapped over the upper half of the bridge from an unfinished International Violin A-style kit that I'll get back to working on real soon now, I promise. No problems after that, and there's plenty of meat there to sand the original piece flat when time permits. There were a few dull spots in the finish, but a couple of passes with Meguiar's Mirror Glaze 7 put that right. The strings that came on it were also worthless as expected. I had always planned to put J-74s on it and it's sounding very good now.
I'll try to make a video clip or two after I've satisfied myself about video and audio recording. I'm kinda being a prima donna about that right now.
And you'll notice that I went ahead and decorated the headstock with some homemade graphics. It's a bit of a joke, something that maybe five people in the world will find amusing, four not counting me. But it seemed a bit austere with nothing there. And if the logos seem pretty fake in the photos, trust me when I say that they're even less convincing in person.
Bookmarks