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A late teens / early twenty's / A2/A4 or snakehead that actually IS in excellent condition at a price I can justify.

Congrats! My RA-5 is two years older than yours... and has cured my MAS completely...... well except for finding a Gibson Oval from the twenties at a price I can justify.:)

GAL. {Guild of American Luthiers}

Only one mandolin..... Ratliff RA-5......
Clark Octave Mandolin

[Full disclosure though..... 9-acoustic guitars. 3-electric guitars. 3- fiddles and a Harmonium.... so I'm just as sick as anyone...

Great article by Graham McDonald in the winter edition of the Guild of American Luthiers periodical. "Field Guide to Mandolins"

Chris Thiele with the closed hand..... Tim O'Brien with the open.
Think it can go either way...... I'd be delighted with 20% of either's capability.

Were I you... I'd consider investing in one of those "Different Drums". [You march kinda funny] :)

Remember all that "French Polish" is a method or technique to apply a finish.... not "a finish"

Shellac is the finish....processed bug poop, dissolved in alcohol, applied with a bit of oil added...

I'd say that looks pretty darned GOOD! Gives me hope and some confidence when it is my turn.

If you haven't sealed it yet I assume you could do a bit more on the top, maybe bring the darker tones...

Left hand nails have always been trimmed as short as possible without blood loss.

I do repair and restoration and can't count the number or "9 miles of bad road" fingerboards I've had to deal with...

The bridge is off center from the center point of the spider, unlike a dobro where it is centered and split with the cone tension screw down the center between the two halves of the bridge.

Were...

Nicely done there!
What is the Scale length?
Bit difficult to see from the photos…. is the top carved arch, induced arch, or "flat" ?

Tim O'Brien comes to mind.. "One Girl Cried"… "Lay Down Your Weary Tune" are two that he regularly plays on his OM.

I think your plan for the headstock is right on point, I've done the same thing on a couple of "exploded" banjo headstocks.

As far as the finish goes….. Alcohol may or may not "cut" the old finish...

Well done Tom! Take a look at Frank Ford's site frets.com for some of the best pictorial tutorials on repair work by one of the worlds best and longest serving repair luthiers.

Remember…....

Mike is correct that, if you can get them to, a replacement guitar with a pin bridge, in that price range will be less likely to give you problems in the future.

That being said a pinless designed...

Not acceptable!!! Unstring it and get ye to a luthier. Clean bridge removal/reglue is straight forward if you catch it before it tears itself off.

Pinless bridges on moderately priced guitars are...

My A2 is #49946 with a 11149 FON which I have understood to be 1919 mfg. Fun to get a bit of "maternity ward" trivia for our mandolins.

149560149561My Shop is in the daylight lower floor of my house…. I live alone so that "issue" is not relevant. My only large power tools are a band saw and a drill press. Neither creates a lot of...

If my music appreciation was based, to any degree, on a single genre or what I was capable of technically playing….. Life would really Suck!

I have never sold, only purchased. The anxiety can go both ways, especially with a costly item.
I have purchased from businesses, Elderly, Gruhn's, Clark, etc., and from individuals.
I always start...

Speaking for myself there mate…...:)

I'd be willing to bet that the builder wasn't trying to "create" a fake gibson, unlike the current seller who may be trying to pass it off as one… Some fella's [ Initial "S"] Try at making one for...

Whether with dovetail joints, fitting violin/mandolin bridges or any other joint chalking is a way to incrementally fit the joint as close to perfect as possible.

In a dovetail joint, for example,...

A guitar of about the same scale length of a Zøuk has [medium set]

A string of .045w one step higher than the Zouk G
D string of .035w same for Zouk D
B string of .o17p one step higher than the...