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I can't tell the difference between the raw billets of Engelmann, Red, White, and European with certainty, and yet I'm going to be able to tell them apart by playing them in an instrument...?...

Have Mr. Vessel convert it, and you'll have yourself one fine mandola.... :disbelief:

Yes, here tis'....
No pics as of yet, but I've seen some...



I love seeing honest wear like that...what a cool looking instrument...

"Estimate:
$35,000 - $55,000"

See those reddish lines running with the grain on that Northfield??
Those lines indicate that the wood is either Chinese in origin, or Eastern Red or Rock maple....
Not European, and not Bigleaf......

...but there was a gold mine in those downtown pawn shops... :disbelief:
I lived in Steamboat Springs in the mid-70's, and a trip in to Denver was downright dangerous...




There weren't...

Gibson's problem is actually two words...

Wiki...

...something really cool in the works at Max and Lauri's... ;)

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4504/37711249302_1c6dc681e1_z.jpg

Well, some of those $200 Loars can be pretty funky too... ;)

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4464/37669389256_e747589349_z.jpg

This, and i can't really compare it to anything...
I love the thing...

https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8447/29681971895_afb66e7d16_k.jpg
...

Cedar is lousy bracewood...
You can easily break it over your knee when making kindling for the stove...
...the first time i did that with Red Spruce, i had a bruise on my thigh for a month....not...

Check out this curly Port Orford Cedar...
...and this is the rough, un-planed surface... :disbelief:

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4485/37659721441_19e283213c_k.jpg

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4454/37619532371_b8ee439a1b_b.jpg

:)

(Thanks, Darryl...)

Try posting in the Wanted section in the Cafe Classifieds, Evan...
That would be an excellent place to start...

I've seen a few As sell recently, including "Ella" (John named all his...

You do know you're blowing a hole in the whole "Adi is Better in an F5" theory...? ;)



Hey, you apparently have THE stuff that was used in the early Loars over there...
It would just be...

In many cases, yes.

Take JR's--a famously good-sounding example made from two different trees, one half being about 20 degrees off quarter...
////////////

You couldn't give that wood away...

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4364/23482767988_a455d57d21_b.jpg

...tip of the iceberg is right....

But the question i keep coming back to when I look at some of their procedures is: "Why"?
A lot of that stuff just makes no sense whatsoever...

Well, granted...we haven't seen this happen in MandoLand all that much....
...but in the world of violins, the bench copy is well under way and it's fueling the whole business in a pretty big way......

Knock yourself out...

...but those instruments are not really trying to capture all the Loar quirks...

At least the name in the peghead is legit... ;)
(...although not properly placed or...

Yeah, but the price points aren't quite right.....yet.
A copy of a 20-25K mandolin--if it's any good--is probably worth 20K, right?... ;)
I guess that a modern maker who gets 8-10K for an F5...

I've played it...

There's a mid-range thing happening in good Loars under the ear, and I know it when i hear it...
That "thing" defines a Loar for me, but it doesn't necessarily mean that I want...

A Taylor guitar made from a grafted walnut tree, graft intact...
This pic also shows that fiddleback is genetic...if it was caused by the environment, both the rootstock and graft would display...

Thousands of Epiphone walnut-back-and-sides archtop guitars pretty much led the way on this one....

Wood "quality" has nothing to do with how a mandolin is going to sound...
"Quality"--in the tonewood world--is nothing more than a beauty contest...
It's all about how psychedelic the figure is in...