Mandolin build finished

[Br1ck]

Finished building an F 5 this week. Maybe the hardest project I've done.

I thought it came out pretty good, but got to show it to a mandolin playing friend who raved about it. He plays in several bands and has a hard time being heard. My mandolin is loud and punchy and should go head to head with banjos.

It still needs varnish, but it plays and sounds good. Very satisfying.

[BillRomansky]

Congrats, Brick. Was this a kit, or from the raw lumber? If a kit, what name brand? If from the lumber, go get a beer at the local pub and put it on my tab, pretty amazing either way.

[Br1ck]

Can't take your beer. The mandolin is a bittersweet story. It was a kit from Arches Mandolins. Very nice. Chris Baird, the Arches owner had a CNC. I think the kits were a byproduct of his custom mandolin business, in that the red spruce has some streaking and the back has some mineral deposits. Not the kind of thing that one spending $5K for a mandolin would want. So you got the parts needed fora mandolin, but still need to carve the back and sides. But the f holes and neck and headstock were CNC, which is how most all major builders and many single person luthiers are doing it.

Still. It's taken the better part of a year.

The bittersweet part is the shop was burned to the ground in a wildfire, so everything from tools to wood was lost. He had already discontinued the kits due to taking a regular job, but now may not be building for quite a while.

But my mandolin sounds great. Played it in the white for a month. I'll never think $5K is too much for an F style mandolin. The binding alone is insane. I just had to decline making another for a friend who played mine.

[Silly Moustache]

We want to see it ... in the white or finished.

[Br1ck]

[/IMG]

[Br1ck]

[/IMG]