Lyons & Healy bridge

[Woolybug25]

Hi All. I scooped up this old taterbug and want to bring it back to life. I have rebuilt a few cheap mandolins to learn and thought this would be a fun one to try. I'm making an assumption that it is from the turn of the century, so there aren't a lot of parts out there in the universe. I had two questions on it:

1) I am familiar with the bridge needing to be a low profile, single piece. But where can I find one?
2) As you can see in the pic, the fingerboard has two small chunks out of it and missing two inlay dots. Should I patch those and put new inlay dots in or should I put an entirely new fingerboard on? If the latter, is there somewhere I could find one or should I simply make one out of a piece of rosewood or ebony? It measures at 8.5" and I haven't been able to find one online in that length.

Thanks in advance!

[rickbella]

You might try David Hynds, a British luthier who specializes in bowlbacks: https://www.mandolinluthier.com/index.htm

He has helped me out in the past. Good luck with it.

[rcc56]

A one piece mandolin bridge is available from Elderly Instruments for $13.50.
You would have to fit it, cut it to correct height, and slot it yourself.

If it were me, I'd just find a chunk of ebony and make one from scratch.

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It's a lot less labor to repair the existing fingerboard than it is to install a new one.
I would pull the first 3 or 4 frets, tape the binding out of the way, regularize the broken edge of the fingerboard, and graft in a new piece of ebony.
I'd leave the graft a little on the high side until after it was glued in place. Then I would cut the slots into the graft, level it, and re-install or replace the frets and binding.

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You're not going to find an off-the-shelf pre-slotted fingerboard for that mandolin. It is most likely a 13" scale, and I know of no one who stocks one in that scale.

Your choices are:

1] Order one from Luthier's Mercantile, and pay a $7 up-charge for them to slot it. They are your most practical source for a pre-slotted board. Note-- LMI's owners have announced their upcoming retirement, and will be closing the business soon.

2] order a pre-slotted 13 7/8" scale board from Stew-mac, cut it off at the first fret [which will yield a scale length of ~ 13 1/8"], and move the bridge back 1/8". They charge $26 for a pre-slotted rosewood mandolin board, $35 for ebony.

3] order a blank and slot your own board, which will require an accurate mitre box, a good saw, a very accurate rule, and a very steady hand.

In all those cases, you would have to cut the board to desired length, fret it, and bind it yourself.

[Woolybug25]

Thank you, gentlemen. That is very helpful.

[Jim Garber]

I would also check the angle of the existing neck and see how low the bridge would have to be. If it is under a quarter of an inch you might be better off replacing the fretboard with a thicker one. Sometimes these mandolins need neck resets to be reality playable but a lower end one like this one may not even have a decent neck joint so the thicker fretboard would be the solution. I am guessing all this will become more complicated are you find other issues in this mandolin. Best of luck.