# General Mandolin Topics > Vintage Instruments >  Weird fake f2

## mrmando

This one is really strange. The seller did notice that the headstock is backwards, so give 'em a little credit...

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## Loren Bailey

I remember this one from a couple of years ago. Funny how these things resurface.

Loren

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## Brad Weiss

I never post on these threads- but gawd even the CASE is hideous!!! It is kind of a funky piece of folk art, I suppose.

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## John Hill

Ewww. Kinda makes my coffee taste bad...

John

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## Eric F.

The statement "we don't know very much about old Mandolins" is a dead giveaway that they know what this is and are still trying to get some money out of it. 

Someone compromised my eBay account recently and listed a snowmobile or ATV or something like 8 million times so I'm already mad at eBay scammers.

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## cooper4205

> The statement "we don't know very much about old Mandolins" is a dead giveaway that they know what this is and are still trying to get some money out of it. 
> 
> Someone compromised my eBay account recently and listed a snowmobile or ATV or something like 8 million times so I'm already mad at eBay scammers.


had the same thing happen. italian motorcycles, $10k mountain bikes and alot of cameras. i think it was over 30 items worth over $100k. i couldn't believe it

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## jk245

At "Gibson", this must have been a bad day at the assembly table.
The guy or gal working on it must have had a bad night because he or she could not figure out if it was
"small swirl on the left and large swirl on the right"
or was it
"large swirl on the left and small swirl on the right"?
The quality control guy must have missed it too!

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## cooper4205

why is bidding up to $1000 on it?

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## jk245

> why is bidding up to $1000 on it?


Theres a sucker born every minute 
(NY gambler slang, but not P. T. Barnum)

Then again, those who bid do not belong to this esteemed message board

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## delsbrother

Words can't describe the rich tone that this instrument projects.

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## jk245

By comparison
This is the ebay photo

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## jk245

This is a photo of the GIBSON F-2 (1916) being sold by Elderly
http://elderly.com/vintage/items/90U-4653.htm

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## Mike Buesseler

Wait a minute, you guys, it says "The Gibson" right _there!_ What else do you want?

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## f5loar

So close yet so far away! Was this made for a left handed picker?

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## jk245

Not so fast, the only thing wrong with the ebay item is that someone polished off the decorations on the pearls. Otherwise everything is original.

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## bush-man

lol! I guess the "vandels stole the handels" 

couldn't help myself

russell

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## cooper4205

they wouldn't have handels on 'em in 1919, but they tuner buttons should be yellowed at least

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## Eric F.

$1125 and the reserve is not met! I like how they don't know much about old mandolins, but they DO know this is a 1919 mandolin. I complained to eBay about the listing. I'm tempted to bid a few million bucks, but I don't particularly want to get my account suspended.

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## John Hill

I complained to eBay as well, hopefully it'll get revised/removed soon.

John

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im looking at the pics... and i think it could very well still be a "real" gibson... ive seen crazy insturments from gibson that were mishaps gone right? maybe somethin i dunno... but lots of times insturments make it out of the shop and are not like the others... the only thing that really shows is the inlay is a bit skewed.. i actualy think that is a fine looking mandolin... so what the head stock is upside down??? it looks just fine to me. a picture of the inside label would be telling.

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## Eric F.

Labels have been faked plenty of times. The scroll's wrong and the back is mahogany. It looks like there is a lot of space between the rosette and the soundhole. I suppose someone could have been drunk and they sent it out into the world anyhow, but what about the mahogany?

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## MandoSquirrel

The "The Gibson" inlay looks sloppier to me, also. Stood out when I first looked at the listing.

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## bolannta

"Features include: bound carved Maple top"

Really?

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## mrmando

No, it couldn't be a Gibson. Couldn't have been made using any pattern, jig, or form from the Gibson shop. Never seen an authentic Gibson with a backward headstock, or a scroll or soundhole that far off, or a bridge that short, or inlay that sloppy. I don't even see a label. Not sure how the date 1919 was arrived at... 

The shape of the fretboard is more or less right, but has anyone else noticed that the frets are crooked?

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## Eric F.

The soundhole's lopsided. I don't think that's just a trick of the eye caused by the extension being over it. I think the treble side of the soundhole is actually smaller than the bass side.

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## cooper4205

the points are off too. a 1919 F2 would have a fully bound front scroll

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## Tom C

Scroll is wrong. Rosette is wrong, Ridges are wrong. Points are wrong. Wood is wrong. Peg head all wrong. -Even a lefty would have gibson along the slant. Not much rigt about this.

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## David Newton

No, a drunk did not build this mandolin. I wish I could build something this nice, sober. Maybe back in the day, it was common to inlay the Gibson logo as a sort of "homage" to the real thing. It looks like a nice mandolin to play, but the seller shouldn't be posing it as a genuine.

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## blacksmith

They were right the first time, $39.

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## Joe Dodson

What a bunch of cynics. The one-of-a-kind backwards headstock makes this this, perhaps, the ultimate collectors piece. I'd snap it up myself, except I'm too busy saving $6 million to buy Robert Johnson's Guitar.

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## mrmando

My, that's hilarious. Do such delusions result from inhaling that "old Gibson" smell too deeply? 

The photos appear to show that Johnson's guitar was more beat up when he had it than this one is now. 

I hate to burst your bubble, JoeD, but backwards headstocks are not one of a kind. We've seen 'em before.

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## 45ACP-GDLF5

This mandolin is only 30 miles from me. I ought to go see it in person and give the seller a history/mandolin lesson and then laugh in his face for trying to pass off some kindling for a mandolin.

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## cooper4205

he knows its a fake, i sent a message to him

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## brunello97

This is a very weird scenario. I think a number of us have written to the seller asking him to stand down on his claim. But he does have someone willing to pay over $1100 for this-AND HIS RESERVE HAS NOT BEEN MET. Ouch.

The very thing that makes you rich, makes you poor.

Mick

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## F5G WIZ

It's up to around 3000 now and the sad part is there is a real F2 right below it that is selling for less! Amazing!

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## brunello97

The shame about the new ebay "Bidder 1" type identification system is that there is no way one can contact bidders directly and let them know about such fraudulent descriptions. I guess such anonymous i.d. helps with some scamming, but it certainly is allowing this scam to go this far. 

Also surprising, though, is someone having this much $$ to drop on an instrument without a basic knowledge of what you are buying.

Mick

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## newbreedbrian

> Also surprising, though, is someone having this much $$ to drop on an instrument without a basic knowledge of what you are buying.
> 
> Mick


you said it.

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## Jim M.

I asked the seller two questions and received no response. I suspect there is some shill bidding going on. I've reported the item to Ebay as a counterfeit item. Maybe that will help.

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## acousticphd

> Words can't describe the rich tones that this instrument projects.#


Actually, it looks like Orville himself could well have carved this back from and old chair seat, as he is said to have done. Interesting looking mandolin in some ways - I'm intrigued by the absolute lack of any visible wood grain in the top!

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## f5loar

Wow this may break a record price for a fake Gibson F2. What I can't conceive is why a quality builder like this would go so far out of the way to copy the F2 and not the F4 and do the peghead backwards. What's the condition you have when everything appears backwards? Anyway seems like a lot of work for nothing.

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## mrmando

Ah, that's what it is ... a 1919 hand-carved copy by Orville of the instruments then being produced by the company he'd sold years earlier. Unfortunately, by this time Orville was both nearsighted and dyslexic due to his advanced age, which accounts for all the things he got wrong. 

Oops, looks like Orville died in New York in 1918.

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## jimbob

maybe it'll turn out like the old stamp with the airplane printed upside down and be worth about a zillion bucks....

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## jk245

This thread leads me to several conclusions:

The internet is prone to scams, misconceptions, and sometimes just errors in judgment and knowledge. 

There is almost no monitoring of the internet. If the Ebay management does not respond to claims of 'fraud' or mis-information then their site should always be fully scrutinized for accuracy.  

The buyers of things through the internet have responsibility to research the products being sold and evaluate if is is as advertised. If not as advertised, is it worth the price paid.

In researching products which are unknown, websites, such as this Mandolin cafe, serve a valuable purpose to give practical information for evaluation. I would doubt that members of this message board would bid on the subject products. It is purportedly shown to be of questionable value for the price quoted (bid). 
Others who have bid have likely not done their homework. "let the buyer beware".

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## mrmando

After the auction closes, the winning bidder is de-anonymized. I'll try to remember to send him or her my condolences at that time.

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## dunbarhamlin

It does perhaps highlight my disinterest in the Gibson F styling, but I actually think this one improves upon the aesthetic of the original. Pehaps it is well that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Cheers
Steve

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## jim simpson

I'm thinking the builder knowing that he was making a copy, made the headstock backwards to make it clear that it was a copy - sort of like early Takamine's script decal that looked like Martin.

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## allenhopkins

If this were going for a few hundred bucks, I might bid on it just to take it to festivals and start some discussion/controversy.

Once it gets into four figures, the price starts exceeding the "fun value."

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## Joe Dodson

> The buyers of things through the internet have responsibility to research the products being sold and evaluate if is is as advertised. If not as advertised, is it worth the price paid.


Yeah. The seller should be tarred and feathered. But then again, there's no need to line up to be a victim either.

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## manjitsu

Well, the seller updated his description a little to at least mention that there has been some question as to whether or not the mandolin is genuine. 

The seller writes "While we are not mandolin experts we have seen thousands of Gibsons and this Mandolin lives up to Gibson quality standards in every way."

Hard to read that with a straight face this seller is either truly ignorant of that which he's selling or just plain dishonest.

Sheesh ebay.

-Chris

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## markishandsome

Oh yeah, you gotta handle at least TENS of thousands of gibsons to be an expert. I've never handled a genuine F2/4, but I can tell apples from oranges. This one's so fake it doesn't even look fake. A rather loose interpretation at least. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Selling it as real is another matter.

Devil's advocate: I've sold instruments on ebay before, and I always get at least one dude who sends me a message saying my listing isn't legit, or that i'm misrepresenting it, or that i'm not a real man, etc. Also a whole bunch of questions from people who obviously haven't read the listing at all ("who is the maker?" or "how much is shipping"). From these experiences it's clear to me that people who buy things on ebay are at least lazy, probably ignorant and possibly crazy. There's no reason to expect sellers to be any different. This seller might be malicious, or he could just be a genuine moron.

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## Joe Dodson

> The seller writes "While we are not mandolin experts we have seen thousands of Gibsons and this Mandolin lives up to Gibson quality standards in every way."


This statement sort of implies that it is possible to handle thousands of Gibsons and conclude that "Gibson quality standards" would allow the release of a mandolin with the wrong tonewoods, a backwards headstock, and a raggedy-looking headstock inlay.

I'm not going to weigh in on this debate, but I know a fair number of guys on the Unofficial Martin Guitar Forum who would agree.

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## tiltman

"From these experiences it's clear to me that people who buy things on ebay are at least lazy, probably ignorant and possibly crazy. There's no reason to expect sellers to be any different. This seller might be malicious, or he could just be a genuine moron."

- hey, don't hold back, tell us how you really feel!
 
seriously cracking up here...
Kirk

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## otterly2k

well, it seems almost certain that the seller knows. at first the seller says "we know nothing about old instruments" and then changes to "we've seen thousands" and claims to be able to vouch for the quality. With no details about the instrument and no efforts to document authenticity, I think the unfortunate moron is the buyer, not the seller.

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## Eric F.

Agreed, Karen, but it frosts my onions that eBay lets sellers get away with this sort of thing. The main issue is it's just wrong, but I occasionally sell items there and this sort of thing just encourages people to stay away.

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## John Hill

I'm with you Eric. I sell from time to time there and this type of activity just isn't good. I even complained to eBay twice with specific issues about this mando and so far nothing. It is curious to note how the bidding has cooled off since "someone" met their reserve price.

John

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## Bernie Daniel

> After the auction closes, the winning bidder is de-anonymized. I'll try to remember to send him or her my condolences at that time.


Yes just send them a link to this thread! #They can read and weep!

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## Joe Dodson

I'm not a frequent e-bayer, in part because of this kind of nonsense. Can somebody explain this anonymous bid stuff to me?

Looking at this Bid History, it looks like several bidders repeatedly bid against themselves to get the price up. Is that really what happened (which would be another indicator of fraud in my mind), or am I misinterpreting this?

Thanks. I don't want to jump to conclusions, I just don't understand how this works.

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## mrmando

The anonymous-bid option was just introduced by eBay. Ostensibly, it prevents people from contacting bidders and saying stuff like, "I have a 1957 Chevy engine just like the one you're bidding on -- for a hundred bucks less!" Unfortunately, it also keeps me from contacting a bidder and saying, "That F2 is a fake. Check out this thread on Mandolin Cafe."

Let's say the opening bid on an item is $5. Bidder A comes along and bids $1,000, but since no one's bidding against him, his bid shows up as $5. Now I'm the second bidder. I bid $10, but Bidder A is still in the driver's seat because his earlier bid was higher. eBay will take Bidder A up to $10.25 or whatever the next highest increment is. So I bid again, this time for $100. The price goes up to $102.50 and Bidder A is still in the driver's seat. I bid again, this time for $1,001, and now I'm in the driver's seat, since I outbid Bidder A. But it took me three bids to get there. That's what's going on when you see multiple bids from the same bidder.

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## Joe Dodson

Thanks for the clarification. I thought it might be something like that

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## markishandsome

I once reported a listing of a loar L5 where the pics and description were lifted directly from elderly.com. The auction was pulled. I don't think the ebay fraud police are would just let their patrons get screwed because they like it. At any one time there are about 1000 auctions running in the mandolin category, usually about 50 going for over a grand. And that's one small sub-sub-category amongst millions of simulataneus listings, a decent chunk of which are fake. We here may only watch the mando category, but they have to watch all of them. They don't have enough employees to investigate every listing someone complains about. Like i said before, someone has complained (at least to me) about every (totally legit) auction i've ever posted. 

They also don't know jack about mandolins! From their stringed instruments "buyers guide":




> Mandolin: Mandolins have almond-shaped bodies with four to six pairs of strings and a fretted fingerboard. The instrument was most popular from 1600 to 1800 and is tuned like a violin. The Neapolitan mandolin, an instrument that appeared about 1750, is played with a plectrum, rather than strummed, and its strings are made of metal.


All they can do is delist things that are blatantly not owned by the seller (like things cropped from websights or previous auctions) or somehow expressly violate their guidelines. Things like this that require a judgement call fall under "buyer-beware". They're not big brother.

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## cooper4205

if it says gibson its gotta be a <a href="http://cgi.ebay.com/GIBSON-RARE-AND-UNUSUAL-EARLY-MODEL_W0QQitemZ300082037279QQihZ020QQcategoryZ1017  9QQrdZ1QQc
mdZViewItem" target="_blank">real one</a>  

you think some people would use the power of google before they try to sell something.

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## John Hill

Now that's funny! And rare, very rare indeed!

John

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## brunello97

Cooper4205, 
Yours is a great companion post to current ongoing thread about fake Gibson labels. 

You know it's funny, I think of the mandolin community as being so small (and tightly connected in part thanks to this place) that it continues to amaze me that there are enough criminal minds out there to think "I know, I'll try the 'old mandolin fraud' scam and see if that works." Aren't there enough banks to rob or Nigerian bank schemes to see these people through? I do remain pretty naive and trusting despite years of contrary experience. 

Oh, and I'm the recent recipient of an ebay 'second chance offer' on a L+H Model B archtop that sold for over $2000. They were willing to let me have it for my bid price of $125. Did I pass up a bargain?  :Wink: 

Mick

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## f5loar

Cooper, at least they used a real Xerox copy of the real "Gibson" logo since most just grab the little Testor's white model paint bottle and hand letter it.
In defense of "some" of the ebay sellers many really do not know and only go on what they see. They buy these things are yard sales to re-sale on ebay and if you are a yard sale kind of resale junker you see the Gibson or Martin name and go from there. They pay $10 bucks for it at the yard sale in hope of making thousands on ebay. What I hate is those sellers that multiple knowlegeable people from here tell them it's not a Gibson and they still don't change their description. And those that are smart enough to go to the Gibson website to look up dates for serial numbers also are mislead by the Gibson site. There many serial numbers that overlaped years and they only way to tell for sure is you got to know your catalog/hands on descriptions.

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## manjitsu

Looks like they shut the auction down.

Order and balance is restored to the mando-universe. 

-Chris

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## Jim Broyles

The seller's name ID is mel something or other. Maybe it's Mel Gibson, so the description is accurate.

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## Eric F.

Wow. I think eBay probably got tired of my daily reminder that this was a fake.

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## Bill Snyder

Fraud is not limited to ebay. Shopgoodwill has been known to misrepresent items, although I think in their case it is generally due to ignorance.

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## jk245

> This one is really strange. The seller did notice that the headstock is backwards, so give 'em a little credit...


This 'guy' was removed. The link says

This listing (130078455512) has been removed or is no longer available. Please make sure you entered the right item number.
If the listing was removed by eBay, consider it canceled.

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## John Hill

Looks like the "rare & unusual gibson" ended up just being an old Kay-Craft...whodathunkit?

<a href="http://cgi.ebay.com/KAY-KRAFT-EARLY-MODEL-WITH-GIBSON-LABEL_W0QQitemZ300082037279QQihZ020QQcategoryZ1017  9QQrdZ
1QQcmdZViewItem" target="_blank">http://cgi.ebay.com/KAY-KRA....iewItem</a>

John

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## Jim Nollman

I once bought a mandolin on Ebay. it looked sweet in the picture. When it arrived, i noticed immediately that the neck was separating quite severely from the body. There was lots of dust and grime in the separation, plus very rusty strings. 

I immediately contacted the seller asking either for a vast reduction in price or a return. I was quite shocked when he responded by attacking me for inventing these problems, because he had sold it to me in perfect condition. The guys response was way out of line. 

So I contacted Ebay's fraud department, and filed a formal complaint which included the email correspondence between the seller and me. I also had taken the mandolin to a local luthier, and sent Ebay the list of the things he said he'd have to do to make the instrument playable. It was about the same amount i had paid for the instrument.

Ebay was very responsive to me. The luthier's letter had clearly made it a credible case. The seller still insisted that rthe mandolin had been in perfect condition when he sent it. So now with Ebay in his ear, he wrote them that FedEX must have broken it in shipping. I responded by saying tghat the state of the strings and all the dust inside the separation, made it look like the instrument hadn't been played 30 years or more. 

Anyway, to make a long story short, Ebay gave the seller the choice of never using Ebay again, or paying my luthier full price to make the instrument playable. Since the seller was an Ebay pro, with over a 1000 sales, i got my check within the next week.

I later concluded that the seller may not have been the crook i first thought he was. I can easily imagine that he buys and sells 20 or 30 things at a time. Maybe he got the instrument in an estate parcel, without ever even looking at it. He took a quick photo, and then used some standard Ebay hype about the perfect mandolin, without ever really looking at it. He obviously was not a musician. And when my sale was concluded, someone in his "store" simply wrapped it up and sent it out. 

The fact that he attacked me, made me feel that this is the way the guy does business with everyone after too many years of dealing with customers who never get to examine the wares until they arrive by mail. The mandolin plays great now. You can see it on the Kay instrument thread.

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## Jim Nollman

( I responded by saying that the state of the strings and all the dust inside the separation, made it look like the instrument hadn't been played 30 years or more. )

whoops! what I really meant to say here, is that the instrument had probably been broken and unplayable for 30 years or more.

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## mythicfish

" Looks like they shut the auction down."

But this thread keeps on going, and going....

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