GAS torture: decked out A-style or low-end F-style?

**Dale Ludewig** · Nov-02-2017, 12:57pm

I didnt appreciate spruce vs adirondack for years. Now that i have guitars and mandos with addy, i think its a plus. In terms of guitar amplifiers, addy has more headroom and seemingly, for me, treble clarity. Spruce is great too, but addy is my preference.

There are a number of different spruce species, and adirondack is one of them. In my experience, you can't safely make sweeping claims about any particular species.

**geter_phd** · Nov-08-2017, 11:35pm

Thanks for all your thoughts. I bought the Beartooth. When I took it back to the shop after borrowing it for the weekend I felt like part of my soul had been ripped out, so I took that as a sign that I must have it.

A big plus is that it is new, even though 13 years old. I took great pleasure registering the warranty on Weber's website. I couldn't possibly get anywhere near this level in an F style new (even old stock) for $2200. Yes, I will probably have a few pangs of regret for not getting an F. Seeing that Yellowstone above gave me such a pang, but I remind myself that it is used, and even though described as being in "great condition," I'd rather have a new instrument that I have seen and played and fallen in love with. As I said in my initial post I bought and returned a mando through reverb.com described as "excellent plus", it definitely was not.

Also, as stevedenver noted above, I'm accustomed to guitar prices, so $4-5K for a new mid-level F is some serious sticker shock. This $2200 is the most I've spent on an instrument since I bought my Martin HD-28 new in 2002, I think it was ~$2500. Someday maybe I'll get an F style, I'm just not ready (or able) to put that much $$ into a mando right now. I'd eventually like to have both an A and F. Hey, I've got multiple guitars to suit different music styles, why not have both types of mandolin?

Plus, this. That's a Beartooth.

**Don Grieser** · Nov-09-2017, 5:35pm

Congrats and enjoy! Good decision.

**CES** · Nov-09-2017, 6:07pm

Good call, IMHO. If you find yourself having to have a scroll you can always pick up an Eastman 315 or 515 pretty inexpensively down the line, but now you know you’ve got a keeper, with no risk!!