BlueMountain
Jul-12-2006, 12:19pm
You may have noticed the 12 string electric "mandolins" Tony Tsai of Taiwan is offering on eBay. Here's a very brief report. I bought one at a good price, and it arrived two weeks later. Here's the URL: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws....IT&rd=1 (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7423714061&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWN%3AIT&rd=1)
In short, it's NOT a mandolin, and it can't really be used as one without modifications. I tried tuning it in 7ths: from the low string: ECGDAE. As you can see, there's a mandolin there at the top and a mandola in the middle--very useful combination. I have a 10 string cittern tuned CGDAE that works great, but it has a long neck. In this case, the high E was so high that I broke a string. (I don't know the gauge--it might need .008 gauge strings). The low E needed a larger gauge string--the tension was too low.
More important, the intonation on the ECG courses were WAY off--unplayable. You might notice that this has a Les Paul-style electric guitar bridge that has two metal posts set in drilled holes in the solid body. To come close to getting the intonation right, I would need to remove the bridge, plug the low-string side hole, and drill another one about 7 mm. closer to the tail. Even then, I'm not sure that the intonation would work on the low E, but at least it could be adjusted to play accurately at the octave.
Oh, also, the neck is the width of a 12 string guitar at the nut, and the fret layout is not mandolin spacing but mandola spacing.
The sound is promising, as far as electric mandolins go, though I need to adjust the height of the pickups on the treble side. I don't know whether I'll try redrilling the bridge. And it never sounds like an acoustic mandolin, so don't expect it to.
I wrote to Tony Tsai to ask about the tuning, and one of his employees wrote back to say that it should be tuned LIKE A GUITAR! The ad doesn't mention this, and it's advertised as a mandolin. Is a twelve string instrument with a short neck in guitar tuning a mandolin or a short necked guitar. I would say that it is NOT a mandolin. But will I send it back? $80 in shipping each way? I think not.
In short, it's NOT a mandolin, and it can't really be used as one without modifications. I tried tuning it in 7ths: from the low string: ECGDAE. As you can see, there's a mandolin there at the top and a mandola in the middle--very useful combination. I have a 10 string cittern tuned CGDAE that works great, but it has a long neck. In this case, the high E was so high that I broke a string. (I don't know the gauge--it might need .008 gauge strings). The low E needed a larger gauge string--the tension was too low.
More important, the intonation on the ECG courses were WAY off--unplayable. You might notice that this has a Les Paul-style electric guitar bridge that has two metal posts set in drilled holes in the solid body. To come close to getting the intonation right, I would need to remove the bridge, plug the low-string side hole, and drill another one about 7 mm. closer to the tail. Even then, I'm not sure that the intonation would work on the low E, but at least it could be adjusted to play accurately at the octave.
Oh, also, the neck is the width of a 12 string guitar at the nut, and the fret layout is not mandolin spacing but mandola spacing.
The sound is promising, as far as electric mandolins go, though I need to adjust the height of the pickups on the treble side. I don't know whether I'll try redrilling the bridge. And it never sounds like an acoustic mandolin, so don't expect it to.
I wrote to Tony Tsai to ask about the tuning, and one of his employees wrote back to say that it should be tuned LIKE A GUITAR! The ad doesn't mention this, and it's advertised as a mandolin. Is a twelve string instrument with a short neck in guitar tuning a mandolin or a short necked guitar. I would say that it is NOT a mandolin. But will I send it back? $80 in shipping each way? I think not.