MandoCello?

[sebastiaan56]

Can anyone point me to plans or dimensions for a Mandocello? Just a fancy Im having (along with an Oud or Lute). What kind of strings would it use?

[kiwigeo]

Mandocello strings?

[sebastiaan56]

had that coming didnt I....

Graham, (or anyone for that matter)

I assume I can blow up the plans in the Bouzouki book for a string length of 27.5" but Im thinking single sourse bassish type instrument, tuned in fifths of course. Any comments?

[kiwigeo]

Sorry Senastiaan......got too much spare time here. French Polish job has gone bad on me so decided to shut up the shop and spend the rest of the day in the house annoying my wife.

[graham mcdonald]

'morning all,

The Gibson mandocellos used either a big mandolin body, or in the case of the Loar era ones in the early 20s, an L5 guitar body with a standat width (I think) neck and the peghead drilled for mandolin tuners. They used the standard Gibson guitar scale (24.9"?), which meant they had to use realy big strings (.072 for the bottom C) This means a big plodgy sound, good perhaps for mandolin orchestras but maybe a bit dull. Remember that the bottom C string is 4 frets lower than a guitar bottom string, so you really do want a decent body size, and a guitar shaped body means you can sit it on your knee. I make mine with a a 26" scale (the longest scale on the Ibex fret ruler) which need at least a .056 string on the bottom, but I reckon you could easily go another fret longer to around 27.5" and be able to use a lighter string. Construction can either be an archtop if you are feeling adventurous or build a flatop with a pin bridge (like the flat-top bouzoukis in the book) Tension will be pretty close to a 6 string guitar with double strings (and they really need the double strings for the sound, don't be thinking about singles strings), so a simple approach would be to build a flat-top guitar with a longer scale and slightly different bridge and peghead, or build an archtop guitar and change the same things

Hope that is a bit useful

graham

[sebastiaan56]

Martin,

Been a while since I played with the French Polish so I will refrain form comment. Sometimes fleeing and moderate ingestion is the best approach,

Thanks Graham. Useful as always, the L5/L7 body would be a lot of fun as well, time to do some drawing,

Sebastiaan

[Hesh1956]

In my experience it's much easier to annoy one's wife then it is to do a first class french polish job........