Official Luthiers Forum! :: View topic - Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build

The voting is baffling...I have a PM from one of our more electic former members, who reminded me that not only did he not vote for the octomans (what a rascal!), but elected to vote at least twice for another project. At least in terms of appearance, it's hard to fathom why the counts for the two leaders seem to rise in lockstep, while there's hardly been a vote cast on behalf of the others. Weird.

Oh well...perhaps next time we can have a much more transparent vote with our top three choices noted in a post...secret ballots are fine when there is little possibility of abuse, but within this community, I would much rather see a public post that explained why the poster choose those instruments...better feedback for the participants, more of a horse race (where 10 out of 12 entrants do not end up as collateral damage), and less temptation to game the vote.

Author:	WudWerkr [ Wed Jan 09, 2013 2:33 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Not to take away from you guys Todd . But I was quite surprised that Bryan didnt get more votes . That is an Excellent build . Great work Bryan

Author:	Bryan Bear [ Thu Jan 10, 2013 4:40 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Thanks guys. . . Wud, I'm pretty sure I was supposed to get about 50% of the votes but people kept getting confused and accidentally clicking the buttons above and below mine. That's the only possible explintion

Author:	WudWerkr [ Fri Jan 11, 2013 12:05 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Bryan Bear wrote: Thanks guys. . . Wud, I'm pretty sure I was supposed to get about 50% of the votes but people kept getting confused and accidentally clicking the buttons above and below mine. That's the only possible explintion I tell you what the answer is my friend , we need to have a Mandolin , Ukuele ONLY challenge . I would be interested in seeing how THAT worked out .

Author:	Bryan Bear [ Fri Jan 11, 2013 6:12 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
That would be really cool actually. I thought about a build an instrument type you've never made before challenge too. A mando/uke challenge would be fun, maybe we could throw in dulcimer and banjo too. I've been wanting to make a u-bass. . .

Author:	WudWerkr [ Sat Jan 12, 2013 8:01 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Todd Stock wrote: The voting is baffling...I have a PM from one of our more electic former members, who reminded me that not only did he not vote for the octomans (what a rascal!), but elected to vote at least twice for another project. At least in terms of appearance, it's hard to fathom why the counts for the two leaders seem to rise in lockstep, while there's hardly been a vote cast on behalf of the others. Weird. Oh well...perhaps next time we can have a much more transparent vote with our top three choices noted in a post...secret ballots are fine when there is little possibility of abuse, but within this community, I would much rather see a public post that explained why the poster choose those instruments...better feedback for the participants, more of a horse race (where 10 out of 12 entrants do not end up as collateral damage), and less temptation to game the vote. I agree that it seems skewed more so than it should , The last poll had three clear front runners however the voting was a bit more spread .

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Author:	Bryan Bear [ Sat Jan 12, 2013 10:40 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
After the first few days it was clearly a two horse race. If you like one of the front runners better than the other, there is no point in voting for any of the other 10. It's kinda' like voting for Perot. Really the best way to handle it is for every voter to rank all the entries and score on total points. The problem is there is no easy way to set up a poll for that and it would create quite the chore for the sponsor to tally from hundreds of posts.

Author:	KMacWill [ Mon Jan 21, 2013 10:24 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Mr. Bear My dad really likes your mandolin and was wondering if there are plans you built it from. We are looking for a project to do together and yours looks cool. We might buy a kit to, but am hoping to get him to do the new contest. Anyway nice mandolin. Kevin

Author:	Bryan Bear [ Mon Jan 21, 2013 1:22 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Octave and Flat Back mandolins in OLF's 2012 Challenge Build
Kevin, I’m glad you guys liked it. There really are no plans; I drew stuff as I was going, but I’ll tell you what I can. I started with my OM plan printed to 66.7% but shortened the body very slightly, I don’t remember off the top of my head by how much. Really I ended up redrawing the whole outline but I tried to keep the curves of the body fairly close to the OM feel. The bridge location is pretty much where it would be on an OM with relation to the waist/lower bout. The rest of the shape (bassside upper bout curve, curly-que sound hole and cutaway) were drawn out by trial and error with French curves. . . I’ll list out some points to consider below; hopefully this will help you avoid trouble and some of the head scratching I had to do: Shape- Once I had the shape drawn out, I was able to figure out the heel block shape (actually a few back and forths to get it all how I wanted it). Keep in mind, you will have to know your desired freatboard width at the join (In my case it was at the 14th fret, but your scale length and desired shape may be a bit different). The reason I shortened the body was to allow me to have the join at the 14th fret with the 14” scale I wanted. At one point when I was working on the rim, I thought I had miscalculated. I even asked questions about it on my build thread. Apparently, it can be easy to get confused if you haven’t done a double cutaway before; as it turned out, I hadn’t made a mistake at all and it all worked out properly. So with your fretboard width, you can decide where you want the “upper horn” to butt up to the kerf in the heel block (half the width of the fretboad from the center). The cutaway side needs to be half the fretboard width from the centerline minus your side thickness (I went slightly wider so I could thin the side to match the heel with the neck mounted). Bridge design- If you choose to go with the pinless bridge like I did, it might be best to figure out your bridge dimensions before you plan out your neck angle and fretboard thickness. I designed the bridge later but it all worked out okay. Get a set of mandolin strings and make sure you design a bridge that is high enough, and wide enough to give you clearance for the windings and work out your string attachment. Then make your saddle wide enough to allow for the compensation of each course of strings. Once you have it in the white you can temporarily string it with a makeshift tailpiece and locate the final position to get your intonation pretty darned close. You can make final adjustments to the saddle when you do the set-up. Bracing- I went with my gut since I had no experience with mados, let alone one like this. I used an X brace and positioned it to land under the bridge wings and still miss the soundhole (barely). The X is about ½” tall and capped, tapered down towards the rim. One tone bar. . . Braces were 6mm thick (but you might be better served with ¼”). Bridge plate was thin and light. Neck geometry- Luckily, this works out well as is. I wanted to have about ½” of string height at the saddle (above the top), my standard top dome (I don’t even know what the measurement is but I used the recommended offsets from Cumpiano’s book and never looked back) worked out to give me a neck angle that worked well. I made the fretboard a bit more than ¼” thick and I got the string height I was after. The best advice I can give is to start with your bridge height (plus a reasonable saddle height) and draw it out in scale, then determine your fretboard thickness. Once you have that all in mind, wing it. . . My build thread is long and boring, but with it and the above it should get you headed in the right direction. As I was typing this and going through my processes it occurs to me that there were several things that would have been pretty tough had this been my first build. I’m not saying it can’t be done as a first, but there are challenges. . . I’m happy to help as you go forward.

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