Standard Mandolin V: complete and for sale

I’ve just completed “Standard” mandolin V (i.e. this is 5^th mandolin built to this design).  If you wish you can read a totally independent review of Standard III by its owner here-

Standard III review

So, number V has: American Black Walnut back & sides with maple bindings,
American Black Walnut neck with maple laminations and carbon-fibre reinforcement strips

European Spruce soundboard with a bound soundhole,

You may remember that I’ve introduced a thin black line around the soundboard? Looks good eh?

Rosewood, compound radius fingerboard with MoP dots & side markers, and wide gold evo frets

Burr Walnut head overlay with Golden Age tuners

It has an open-pour shellac satin finish.I really like the look of this one and it plays very well too: I only wish I could play better so that I could do it justice in my demo videos! And here is that video:

It’s on sale now at 770 GBP which includes a Hiscox case; shipping for the mainland UK is an extra 30 GBP. If you’re interested in owning this mandolin, contact details can be found on my web-site.

Nava Website

Acoustic Soundboard; interview

Apart from Jacob keeping us amused, I haven’t posted much lately as most of my spare time been taken up with an interview for “Acoustic Soundboard”, an independent UK based acoustic guitar forum. If you’re interested in reading it, click on the link below.

Meet the makers- Gary Nava

Also, why don’t you become a member; it’s run by a group of very friendly, hardworking enthusiasts?

Welcome Jacob!!

I’m afraid that not much has been happening in the workshop recently;  Amanda and I have been distracted by this little fella! Here is our new Grandson, Jacob; the latest addition to the Nava range!

Herringbone back strip

I’ve just inlaid the back strip into the back of Nadim’s guitar. As part of the Phil Hare signature guitar’s spec., there’s a decorative rosewood herringbone strip running down the centre of the back. You can put a decorative strip right through the back, when you glue the two halves together, however for a marquetry style strip, I prefer to inlay it.

The first thing is to route a slot about 1mm deep along the centre of the back; this should give you a nice clean groove for the herringbone to sit in. I prefer that the herringbone is glued in with epoxy; as the herringbone is a really snug fit, you don’t want to introduce any moisture (in the form of wood glue). You’ll find that both slot and the herringbone will swell just enough to take a snug fit to, “No way, where’s the hammer!” And you don’t want that, hence the use of epoxy.

 Clean-up is with a nice sharp plan and hay presto!

In the white

All the construction of the next Standard mandolin is complete, as you can see in the photos below.

I really like the contrast between the American black walnut and the maple. With the “woodwork” complete, it’s been strung up and the action and intonation set-up. I’ll leave it to settle for a few days and then strip it back down and start applying the finish.

Not too long before she will be available for sale!

Work has started on the next two instruments; Nadin’s Hare signature guitar and John’s Standard mandolin. I find that when working on a mandolin and a guitar at the same time, I’m constantly double checking dimensions;  pieces of wood for the guitar look too big and by comparison pieces for the mandolin look too small!

Standard Mandolin V

The next Standard mandolin (number 5) is well underway. This one has American Black Walnut back and sides and a Black Walnut neck with maple laminations. In order to keep the walnut and maple theme going I wanted to use maple bindings.

I always bend bindings to fit each rebate individually.

I don’t normally use purfling on my Standard range but as the maple binding wouldn’t look right next to the light spruce soundboard, I thought that I would include one very thin black line to offer some contrast. And I’m very pleased with the way it turned out.

The walnut is perfectly quarter-sawn and I’ve included a little of the sapwood to spice things up! Can’t wait to get some finish on it!

 Here's the head, with a burr walnut overlay-

This mandolin should be completed in about a months’ time and will be up for sale at the price of 770 GBP (including a Hiscox case) mainland UK shipping is an extra 30 GBP. Send me an email if you’re interested in claiming it! Bye-the-way, at the time of writing the e-mando is still available.

There are two threads on the Mandolin Café forum that you might be interested in; click on the links below.

Nava English Walnut Mandolin

Nava Electric Mandolin

English Walnut Standard Plus

I’ve just completed this English Walnut Standard Plus for Tony and it will be shipped off to him soon. I love this walnut; it’s such a good wood to work, looks brilliant once finished and makes a great sounding mandolin! 3 out of 3 ain’t bad!

Here are some choice photos for you.