Vintage Kalamazoo Mandolin

[Mandolinian]

Pulled from the depths of my instrument storage place, my first mando, a 1926 (?) Kalamazoo saw the light of day again. I'd made the mistake of not loosening the strings, and the action was low, but my playing and knowledge of mandos has drastically increased since the last time I played it 2-3 years ago. The notes were barely sounding at all and the chop had almost no pitch at all, just slack, so I raised the action significantly. The tone changed hugely, and I learned that this instrument has a nice mellow low end and a clean high end. Treble could be better, and the action is still lower than I'd prefer. Maybe I'll raise that a bit more later today or tomorrow.

Does anyone have any stories about Kalamazoos? Any other mandomaniac's thoughts?

Also, anyone know about how much this is worth?

Thanks,
--Sam


Edit: Very unsure about date.

[rcc56]

That's either a KM-21 [mahogany back] or a KM-22 [maple back].
The K'zoo f-hole mandolins were available from roughly 1935 through 1942.
Some of them sound quite good.

If the back on yours in as nice shape as the front, it's in unusually good condition.
There have not been many recent listings on K'zoo mandolins. Asking prices on their guitars have gone up over the last few years. I'll just say its value is "modest." There are two "sold" listings on Reverb between $500 and $600. It would seem to me that they could bring a bit more, at least on a good day.

Oh, since you've had some problems with the set up since you took it out of storage, it wouldn't hurt to have a good repairman put a light and a mirror in the f-holes and make sure the braces look like they are still tightly glued. I see loose braces fairly often in Gibson products made in the 1930's through the 1950's.

[Mandolinian]

Thanks so much for the info. I remember it's either '26 or '36 and from what you said about when they were made, seems like it must be the latter. I may take it to Joe Cleary, he worked on my Weber a while back.

-S