I need to find a sturdy box that is a good size for shipping a mandolin in a Calton case. Any helpful advice will be greatly appreciated.
I need to find a sturdy box that is a good size for shipping a mandolin in a Calton case. Any helpful advice will be greatly appreciated.
Get a guitar box and cut it down.
Shaun Garrity
http://www.youtube.com/user/spgokc78
If you go to a store where they sell appliances you can obtain an oversized box, and make it into a shipping box. I have done this a few times. The appliance boxes are pretty sturdy.
Eric Hanson
Click #016/ Born on 2/29/08 - Sold to the next Conservator of this great mandolin!
The search has ceased! (At least for now)
Collings A-Style
White #29R : Oh my!! This one is so AWESOME!!
It's easy. Just visit the classifieds, buy another mandolin, and have it shipped to you. You'll have the box you need in a few days.
Thanks Shaun. I've got a guitar box I could cut down but I'm a bit nervous about how a damages claim would be treated if the box was cut down. I had a UPS guy warn me that they are picky about boxes that have been cut down.
Rich
This is a tough one.
Unfortunately for us, they just don't seem to make cartons the right size that are easy to come by. You have a few options. (1) Find a music store in your area and ask them if they have any lightly used cartons that they can give or sell you. This might well be possible in Seattle. (2) Ship your case it in an oversize box with lots of packing (this can wind up costing quite a bit more, since many shippers go by L+W+H as a size metric). Places like UPS are only too happy to do that! (3) Get an oversize carton, say 30" x 16" x 16", from an outfit like UPS, and cut it down to a more appropriate size.
You do can a pretty acceptable job of resizing a box with a yardstick/straightedge, some mylar packaging tape, and sharp utility knife. But the job is a lot easier if you have a tool like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Box-Resizer-Cardboard-Cutting-Reducer/dp/B0882TZ892/
You might try Uline. They have guitar boxes but not sure about mandolin sized. Unfortunately you may have to purchase more than one.
https://www.uline.com/BL_7906/Guitar-Boxes
You could also search Reverb. I've seen some vendors sell unused instrument boxes.
American Music, Guitar Center, maybe Dusty Strings or Trading Musician ... somebody can fix you up with a box.
Cutting the top off a guitar box, lightly scoring it and making some new flaps doesn't compromise its structural integrity. Other ways of cutting down a box might. The Calton will do a lot of the work for you, but the headstock needs to be immobilized within the Calton and the Calton needs to be immobilized within the box.
There's always the "dumpster dive behind the department store" approach, which is how I got started. I have enough boxes coming and going that I rarely need to do that any more, but it's a viable way to obtain quality cardboard.
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FWIW, the local "big" music store saved their boxes for me and would leave them on the loading dock. I'd fill up my cargo van and drive off, often not unloading until the next morning. More than once I noticed the smell of cat urine "fermenting" overnight inside the van the next morning, which was not noticeable when the boxes were outside on the dock. Anyway, I love to recycle, but something to be aware of.
Years ago I shipped a Loar (as in Lloyd not The) case to a guy in Atlanta. I packed it inside a plastic storage box (like the under bed storage sold at Target and Walmart) suspended in Styrofoam inside a cardboard box I cut down. I took pictures of the packing process so that in the event that there was a claim from the shipper I had my bases covered.
"It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
--M. Stillion
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Here my source of cardboard box material is the Bicycle Shop .. Big panels ..
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The mandolin store recently shipped me a Calton case in the perfect sized box.
(Not too giant)
Calton (guitar) cases were originally shipped in a paper “blanket” which was filled with either straw or wood chips. We are, however talking about 1976 and Keith offered me a discount if I returned the packaging to him. This I duly did at the Cambridge Folk Festival so it was new Calton case and the likes of Steve Goodman and John Hartford for the weekend and I picked up my first half decent mandolin the week after I got back. Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be!
Last edited by Ray(T); Apr-23-2021 at 3:14am.
Same for me. There is one right in my town. I usually only need their boxes when shipping guitars. I think Calton cases are probably deeper than other standard mandolin cases so in that case I would also check a store that sells lamps and lighting. their boxes might be deeper even squarish in cross-section.
Jim
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1924 Gibson A4 - 2018 Campanella A-5 - 2007 Brentrup A4C - 1915 Frank Merwin Ashley violin - Huss & Dalton DS - 1923 Gibson A2 black snakehead - '83 Flatiron A5-2 - 1939 Gibson L-00 - 1936 Epiphone Deluxe - 1928 Gibson L-5 - ca. 1890s Fairbanks Senator Banjo - ca. 1923 Vega Style M tenor banjo - ca. 1920 Weymann Style 25 Mandolin-Banjo - National RM-1
By coincidence, I happened to see this bit of information on frets.com about cutting a large guitar shipping box down mandolin size. http://frets.com/FretsPages/General/.../cutboxes.html
Most "box stores" (shipping and boxing stores) will sell cardboard flat sheets in the 4 foot square or larger sizes and you can simply make your own box to exactly fit. If you want, make it double layer by making and sealing the inside box with the case in it, then custom make an outer box. Hard to imagine that a carrier would be able to claim that was defective in any way. Cardboard flat sheets are way cheaper than buying an already made box and no kitty whiz smell!
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A violin in its case is being shipped to me (in Arizona, an hour from Phoenix) from Iowa. The seller took the violin in its case to UPS and had them package it for shipping. The cost for packaging and shipping was $85. It seems to me that while the cost seems crazy, it should make for bulletproof claims, should any damage occur. Considering the value of the case alone, it might be worth the cost to you.
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And Giuliana, my 2002 Hans Schuster 505 violin, Nehenehe, my 2021 Aklot concert ukulele,
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I have had luck finding the right sized boxes at the local band instrument store. I have scored boxes that were used to ship saxophones, trumpets, trombones, violas and various types of drums.
As an aside, I have also cut down many guitar boxes and used them to ship mandolins made by Givens, Carlson, Heiden and Gibson... no insurance claims ever.
Sam Lyman
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