Mando Cheepo - Makeover of a Rover RM-50

[motopug67]

Here's a brief video description of my recent project to upgrade an inexpensive solid wood mandolin. There's a short sound sample at the end. I realize the irony of spending so much time on such an instrument. It was done as a low-cost, low-pressure learning opportunity. If I got a decent backup mandolin out of it, all the better.

I'm new to posting here but have been reading this forum for quite some time. I'm tremendously grateful for the knowledge and generosity of it's participants.

I wish you all a happy new year.

Sterling

[Eddie Blevins]

Nice little project, Sterling. I have a Rover at home that belongs to my guitar player's son. He dropped it and the neck came loose. I'm going to reset the neck for him and now that I've seen your video, I may do some upgrades like radiusing the fretboard and changing the hardware for him.

[Kerry Krishna]

You have done an excellent job here, I would thing that the SS frets were way overkill, but if they were raidiused to 16 already, I can see why you installed them. Thanks for sharing this..

[P.D. Kirby]

Great Job and Welcome to the Cafe. Don't know what the Mandolin sounded like before the upgrade but it sure sounds great now. I'd say you got your money's worth plus the experience of doing your own re-fret so now all that's left is to play the fire out of it... What brand of Bridge did you use? CA?

[motopug67]

Thanks P.D.! The bridge was just the ebony model sold by Stew Mac for $21. I would have liked a CA bridge but it was a bit expensive relative to the mandolin.

[motopug67]

Thanks Kerry! The only fret wire I happened to have was the SS74 from LMI. My fret bender made easy work of establishing the radius. Without undercutting the tang for the binding, using stainless didn't cost me a lot of extra effort. My last few refrets have been stainless. So, perhaps I've just forgotton how much easier using nickle is. :-)

[John Hill]

Hey that sounds pretty good. Nice job.

[Clement Barrera-Ng]

Great job and the mandolin sounds really good. Thanks for sharing your wonderful project!

[Ron McMillan]

Great job and the mandolin sounds really good. Thanks for sharing your wonderful project!

I'm with Clement here. A great project well done. The end result sounds very sweet.

ron

[motopug67]

Thank you all for the kind words of encouragement!

Rover's F-style the RM-75 just arrived at my home via the happy-brown-truck. UPS Here I go again!....So this is MAS....

Sterling

[motopug67]

Doing this project again on Rover's F-style RM-75 didn't work out. The top was not carved properly. It was nearly twice as thick as it should have been and the instrument had an aweful sound. No volume and sounded choked. Amazon sent a replacement but it was just as bad. Another extremely thick top. (The bass side was 1/4" at the f-hole!) It sounded awful. Both are being returned as they were not worth any effort. Apparently, most of the cost of the f-style is in the cosmetics with little concern for sound. The A-style RM-50 seems a far better value.

Sterling

[Bernie Daniel]

Very nice project there and good results. Big kudos that you managed to do all that work and upgrades for only $60! Very frugal. The mandolin does sound good.

So on the re-fret then you just extended the fret slot into the binding (jewler's saw?) then cut the length of wire to go edge to edge I guess? From what I could see in the video it looks great!

Kind of begs the question why bother under cutting the tang and all that anyway because this approach actually gives you a clean looking board and also little extra fret surface to work on when playing.

[Mule Train]

Great job. Love those frets. I am , except for the frets, doing the same thing to my Samick MA-1.

[Folkmusician.com]

I love this! It goes to show that some of the low cost instruments have the potential to be quite serviceable.

[motopug67]

Thanks Bernie! You are correct. I used a small back-saw to extend the fret slot through the binding. I clamped a square block of wood at the slot to use as a guide for the saw. Then, I used my nippers and a file to take the fret ends down flush. Cosmetically, undercutting the fret tang would give a much more pleasing look, without the ends of the tangs peaking through the binding. I'd certainly do this on any "more valuable" mandolin but this project was about economy.

Weather the tang is undercut or not, you should have the same width of playing surface. The end of the fret's crown/top should come flush to the side of the binding. Where you can gain a little extra width is by not beveling the fret end back at a steep angle. This also keeps the fret end from being sharp, if the board shrinks and the fret end protrudes.

Sterling

[Ed Goist]

Outstanding work Sterling!
$150 total or $150 + $93? Either way, you now have an exceptional cost/value ratio mandolin.
Congratulations!

[motopug67]

Thanks Ed! You made me curious. So, I added up the cost of the mandolin plus the other parts/materials. It came to about $170 all totaled. (Arrgh! I missed any shipping on the parts....Accountants!)

What I learned in the project....priceless.

Sterling

[jfaust97]

Doing this project again on Rover's F-style RM-75 didn't work out. The top was not carved properly. It was nearly twice as thick as it should have been and the instrument had an aweful sound. No volume and sounded choked. Amazon sent a replacement but it was just as bad. Another extremely thick top. (The bass side was 1/4" at the f-hole!) It sounded awful. Both are being returned as they were not worth any effort. Apparently, most of the cost of the f-style is in the cosmetics with little concern for sound. The A-style RM-50 seems a far better value.

Sterling

That's weird to hear bad reviews of the Rover RM-75. Everywhere else on the board it seems the RM-75 is pretty well thought of for the money. I am thinking of getting an RM-75 based on this review:



All the other reviews on Cafe seem to agree...
Maybe you're just an elitist with your customized RM-50??
Hahaha... just kidding... I'm sure the amount of effort put into your RM-50 makes it that much more enjoyable!!
Good work on the upgrade!!!

[jim simpson]

Nice work, I'm thinking of SS for my next refret. I've used nippers and a mini-belt sander to undercut the frets for bindings. It does take a bit of time, I haven't worked with SS frets so not sure what to expect.
Enjoy your axe!