'27? F4 on Ebay

[Gary Hedrick]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-1927...item3cc8c9e87a

At the risk of potentially insulting the seller, I just find myself being amazed at these kinds of listings......"selling for a friend"...."don't know much about mandolins" "my repairman told me" and so on.

So we have an F4.......refinished.....the bridge raised way up.....looks like it does have the correct pickguard if it is a 27.....now the experts need to comment on the slant of the The Gibson......I think '27 was a transition year of the angle so it might be right. The keys are something that I'm fuzzy on etc.

This would be a good educational thread for those of us that don't know nearly as much as the Dan, Ken, Tom and Darryl.....

[houseworker]

It's an interesting listing certainly, although I suspect that little of that instrument ever saw the inside of the Gibson factory. The torn out label is reason enough for suspicion.

There's no need to anguish over the slant of The Gibson, since the dot for the i is in entirely the wrong place, a dead giveaway. But my biggest concern is the binding, which looks very poor next to a real F-4 of any vintage. The ivoroid button under the neck heel is wrong too.

I would imagine the Handel tuners are genuine, although they're the wrong period of course. The crosshead screws they're attached with are an aesthetic crime in that context.

[houseworker]

Here's one of the pictures from the listing. As I've already said, I'm unconvinced.

[sunburst]

Never mind, better info showed up while I was typing...

[houseworker]

One final picture. It's not the 'label' that interests me, it's the frets, which on an original neck would reach right across to the (far better quality) neck binding, a consistent feature of Gibson's fretted instruments. It all looks very crude.

[lenf12]

I'll grant that it is not all original (finish, Handel tuner buttons). It may have gone back to Gibson (or someone else) for the refinish job. The heel cap on the back of the neck is what throws me off. What's up with that?

Len B.
Clearwater, FL

[houseworker]

Looking at the headstock a bit more carefully, the tuners aren't Handel, although the buttons might be. They're far more modern, and look fairly cheap.

[houseworker]

I'll grant that it is not all original (finish, Handel tuner buttons). It may have gone back to Gibson (or someone else) for the refinish job. The heel cap on the back of the neck is what throws me off. What's up with that?

Len B.
Clearwater, FL

If this instrument has any connection with Gibson at all (beyond possibly the tuner buttons), my best guess would be that it is an older F-2 that lost its original neck in an accident. It has been rebuilt as a later F-4 in the hope of inflating the value. I'm very confident that neck was never made by Gibson.

[James Sanford]

If this instrument has any connection with Gibson at all (beyond possibly the tuner buttons), my best guess would be that it is an older F-2 that lost its original neck in an accident. It has been rebuilt as a later F-4 in the hope of inflating the value. I'm very confident that neck was never made by Gibson.

I wonder about your comment re the neck not being made by Gibson. Just curious as I am not interested in the mando. Just trying to learn more about this vintage instrument. What do you base that comment on?

Also noticed that the fret wire appears to be square or trapezoidal in the oval hole/label view. Is this consistent with the period?

[sunburst]

I don't know...
To me, the top looks like it came from Gibson. The contours, the rosette, the binding all look right, though refinished most likely (or maybe not, the close up of the rosette and end of the fingerboard look like Gibson finish). The fingerboard looks right, including the binding, minus the fret end tabs that could have been removed during a re-fret.
The back looks like birch and could be from Gibson. I can't tell much about the neck, but I don't see anything that automatically disqualifies it as being Gibson. The heel button definitely doesn't look right and the back peghead veneer extends down the neck shaft too far, but everything else could be refinished Gibson.

[houseworker]

I wonder about your comment re the neck not being made by Gibson. Just curious as I am not interested in the mando. Just trying to learn more about this vintage instrument. What do you base that comment on?

It's hard to find anything that's correct in the neck. Wrong inlay, wrong screws, wrong tuner backplates*, wrong shape veneer to rear of headstock, wrong fretboard, wrong binding.

Also noticed that the fret wire appears to be square or trapezoidal in the oval hole/label view. Is this consistent with the period?

They're not period frets.

* Edit: they are correct

[houseworker]

I don't know...
To me, the top looks like it came from Gibson. The contours, the rosette, the binding all look right, though refinished most likely. The fingerboard looks right, including the binding, minus the fret end tabs that could have been removed during a re-fret.
The back looks like birch and could be from Gibson. I can't tell much about the neck, but I don't see anything that automatically disqualifies it as being Gibson. The heel button definitely doesn't look right and the back peghead veneer extends down the neck shaft too far, but everything else could be refinished Gibson.

It would be interesting to know what the FON is, if it has one. My money would be on it being an earlier F-2 that's been 'upgraded'. The F-4s normally had flamed maple backs. The binding on my own F-4 is far better quality than that, and I can't find a single F-4 in the Mandolin Archive that looks that poor.

[houseworker]

In one respect, I have to admit to being wrong, the back plates for the tuners are the correct pattern.
This entry in the Mandolin Archive has excellent pictures of a similar period F-4 (best downloaded and enlarged) which show the quality of Gibson's binding work. You can also see the correct period inlays in the peghead.

My own F-4 is from somewhat earlier, but again the quality of Gibson's binding work was excellent, and I took this picture for comparison with the one I uploaded from the listing.

[sunburst]

The close-up of the OP instrument does not show evidence of the fingerboard having been removed, indicating originality (perhaps).
Gibson bindings, in my experience, can be anything from pretty good to pretty sloppy.
The "up-graded" F2 hypothesis makes sense for several reasons, including the birch-looking back, but it sure looks like the fingerboard binding has always been there. The peghead overlay looks too new (not period); the inlay, the script, the binding, the whole thing.
Hard to tell what's going on there. I might be able to tell more if I had it in hand.

[houseworker]

Here's a straight comparison of the peghead with the mandolin I linked to in the archive. The proportions are wrong, the inlays are wrong, and the binding is poorer than I've been able to identify anywhere on an original.

[houseworker]

Have exchanged a few emails with the seller, who tells me that the peghead has been plugged and redrilled to accept the (original) tuners. This pretty much confirms my theory that the neck is not original. The last time I saw fretwork like that was on a Japanese copy instrument about forty years ago.

The FON is 9333, which Spann dates to 1929, although this entry in the archive suggests that he could be wrong. Either way, the FON and inked back serial number are consistent.

Since they are not original to the instrument, I've suggested the seller consider offering the Handel buttons separately (as a set). I suspect that the instrument will not fetch much over $2K.

[Joe Spann]

The mandolin on eBay (serial number 84937) appears to be a highly modified F-2, originally manufactured early in 1929.

One of it's close littermates (serial number 84950) turned up a few years ago and was a catalog-standard F-2.

Joe

[houseworker]

The mandolin on eBay (serial number 84937) appears to be a highly modified F-2, originally manufactured early in 1929.

Joe, I was interested in the F-5 I linked to in the archive. Although you list the FON as 1929, the label shows 5/27 which has been taken to mean May 1927. Obviously it could also mean May 27th, or have no bearing on the date at all. Do you have an opinion?

[Joe Spann]

Joe, I was interested in the F-5 I linked to in the archive. Although you list the FON as 1929, the label shows 5/27 which has been taken to mean May 1927. Obviously it could also mean May 27th, or have no bearing on the date at all. Do you have an opinion?

Hello Houseworker,

Here's a little background information which you may find helpful. My approach to the problem of pre-war Gibson serial numbers and FON's encompassed everything they produced. The validity of this method is based on an interview conducted with pre-war Gibson employee Wilbur Marker in 1970. Mr. Marker was an eye-witness to the process of assigning serial numbers and FON's to pre-war Gibson instruments. One of the many essential pieces of data he revealed in 1970 was that the same sequence of Factory Order Numbers (FON's) was used for guitars, mandolins, banjos and everything else Gibson produced before World War II. There was not a seperate series of FON's for mandolins and seperate series of FON's for banjos and so on and so forth. It was all one system. This is important because it means that pre-war Gibson FON's can be studied as one series of numbers.

My revision of the pre-war Gibson production chronology is mainly based on two sources. First, the original Gibson shipping ledgers from March 1935 through the end of World War II (1945). The use of this resource means there can be no question about the correct dating of serial numbers and FON's for the period 1935-1945. For Gibson instruments produced between 1903 and 1935 I have relied on the characteristics of observed instruments in conjunction with my own personal compiled list of Gibson serial numbers and FON's for the period. This list contains detailed information (serial numbers and their associated FON's, physical characteristics, etc.) for over 10,000 individual Gibson instruments built between 1903 and 1935, and in total, the list contains over 27,000 exemplars for the pre-war period. This represents a significant percentage of Gibson's pre-war production and I should probably publish it someday.

All that said to say this.....

The example you pointed to from the Mandolin Archives (serial #84695 - FON 9334) has been traditionally identified as produced in 1927. And this is where my compiled list comes into play....when compared against my collection of pre-war Gibson dealer price lists and advertisements from various trade publications of the period we are able to place good, solid dates on specific FON's. For example...the Gibson style 6 banjo was introduced in August 1928. The basis for this is both Gibson dealer price lists and ads from Mastertone Magazine. The lowest observed FON on a Gibson style 6 banjo is 9106. Therefore, FON 9106 must be from just prior to August 1928. Another example is the Gibson style PT banjo, introduced in January 1929. The lowest observed FON for any Gibson style PT banjo is 9242, which must therefore date to just prior to January 1929. In preparation for my book I identified and dated dozens of such points in the Gibson production series. So, I feel very confident in my revised pre-war chronology. This was then overlaid with dated sales receipts from the period for the process of fine-tuning.

In summary, a mandolin with a FON of 9334 must be from 1929 because there are provable exemplars with lower FON's from an earlier date....and the FON series is universal....the same for all types of pre-war Gibson instruments.

Joe