Inspiration for Mandolinetto

Mandolinetto - Front

Mandolinetto - Back

Mandolinetto - Side

Mandolinetto - 3/4

Hardware

Here’s something that inspired an instrument I built not too long ago. This old instrument looks suspiciously like a ukulele, but it isn’t. It’s strung like a mandolin - eight steel strings in pairs. I saw one of these for the first time -- in fact the only time -- one night watching Devin Champlin of the Gallus Brothers backing Maria Muldaur. He was kind enough to let me take a good look at it -- the label inside said Vernon€ and told me these were quite popular about 100 years ago.

So I posted a query on the Mandolin Cafe asking what these were and if anyone could give me some measurements and guidance to the top bracing pattern so I could build one. Within a couple of days I learned from helpful posters that these are called Mandolinettos and back in the day (1900 to 1920 or so) these sold for as little as $6 to $10 at the likes of Sears and Roebuck.

What’s more, I got a private email from a great guy named Eddie Sheehey who said he’d just bought one and hadn’t yet restored it. He offered to send it to me so I could take measurements and draw plans. I took him up on his offer and he shipped it to me and let me keep it for a couple of months, during which I cleaned it up a bit, took careful measurements, and made the drawings below. So thanks to the kindness of strangers I had the details I needed to build a modern version of one of these. Click the thumbnails above for a good look at the original instrument. Check out especially the grain and pattern of the Brazilian Rosewood. Needless to say. the one I built wasn’t Brazilian. I used Amazon Rosewood, which has similar density and stiffness to Brazilian. I made a few modern modifications: I added a carbon-fiber non-adjustable truss rod to stiffen the neck. All of these old ones need neck resets. Those eight steel strings take a toll over a hundred years, even on a short neck like this.’ And I angled the neck back as on a conventional mandolin so I could use an adjustable bridge with thumb-screw height adjustment.


		Here’s the set of plans I drew from the Mandolinetto Eddie Sheehey loaned me.’ Click the image for a larger view. If anyone is inclined to build one of these, email me and I’ll send you a copy of the plans, which have thus far found their way to builders in several U.S. States, England, Scotland, and Ireland. The headstock measurements and peghole spacing are true to the original instrument. However, there is a need for modification to accommodate modern mandolin tuning machines, which have the tuning post below the worm gear. This instrument and most mandolins of its vintage had the tuning post above the worm gear. You can’t simply install modern tuners upside down because they would work in reverse of every other stringed instrument -- you’d end up loosening when you meant to tighten, which would quickly drive you nuts. Because of the reversed relationship of peg to worm gear, the whole tuning assembly of modern style tuners shifts north by about 1/2 inch, causing the baseplate to extend beyond the top of the headstock--leaving brass sticking out into empty space beyond the wood.

		OK, so we’ve identified the problem; what’s the solution? I can think of three: 1. Find a source of old-style reverse tuners. I hadn’t had any luck when I built mine -- they were available for F-style headstocks, but I couldn’t find any for A-style headstocks. But I see that Stewart Macdonald now sells old-style tuning machines for A-style headstocks. 2. You could make the headstock a bit longer so the brass baseplate of modern tuners no longer extends beyond the top of the headstock. The downside is it’s already a big headstock and making it any bigger might make it look like a snow shovel.

	3. You could shift the post holes south (toward the nut). This is the approach I took. The problem that then needs fixing is the bunching up of strings from the nut to the tuning posts -- e.g., the second G string will rub against the post of the first G string. A solution for this is to change the headstock to a snake-head shape, (like on a snakehead Gibson mandolin or a modern Seagull Guitar). I now include a a 1:1 drawing of my alternate headstock when I send my building plans.






	Gibson Mandolin Snakehead Headstock