Re: Hard cases for Eastman mandola and octave mandolin?
Eastman mandolas used to come with a violin-style hard case; I owned an MDA615 for a few years, since traded in, and it had one of those rectangular, cloth-covered, latch-and-zipper cases with an internal "blanket" over the instrument. (As an aside, the zippers on the Eastman case covers were really lousy; I have had at least two where the pull-tab came off, or the glider broke. Wake up, China –– make better zippers!)
So there's a (remote) possibility of finding an Eastman mandola case used, if it somehow got separated from its original contents. You may luck out on the MK case, though I doubt there's real dimensional uniformity for F-model mandolas.
As for the OM, you well could find a tenor banjo case that will accommodate it, and there are scads of used tenor banjo cases around. (This occurs after enraged audiences smash the tenor banjos to smithereens, leaving their cases intact [jus' kiddin', folks!]) I'd check with any dealer in your area that handles a volume of used or vintage instruments. Eastman deliberately declined to furnish cases for their OM's, which I thought was really cheesy; they're nice instruments, and I'm sure many Eastman OM owners take them out to perform, jam, whatever. They deserve decent cases.
The other possibility is to look at Gold Tone; they make a wide variety of instruments, and cases for them, and your Eastman might well fit into one. I've found their customer service to be pretty decent.
Allen Hopkins
Gibsn: '54 F5 3pt F2 A-N Custm K1 m'cello
Natl Triolian Dobro mando
Victoria b-back Merrill alumnm b-back
H-O mandolinetto
Stradolin Vega banjolin
Sobell'dola Washburn b-back'dola
Eastmn: 615'dola 805 m'cello
Flatiron 3K OM
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