12 string conversion

[Klaus Wutscher]

Hi everybody,

Her is my question: I have a 12 string guitar (flattop) by a local builder, which has a pleasant sound but is gathering dust. Rather than selling it for a couple of hundred bucks I thought of having it converted to either a bouzuki (GDAD) or a mandochello. The bodyshape is a Gibson Jumbo.Would a conversion to a m´chello even be possible/ promising satisfying results? In both cases, wat work would be required in addition to a new neck and a new bridge?

thanks
klaus

[warren]

Hi check out the following link, you may not need to replace either the neck OR the bridge. Good luck
http://www.frets.com/FRETSPa....rt.html

[Paul Hostetter]

First of all, there's no H in mandocello, puh-leeze. The technique Frank Ford shows focuses primarily on adding more strings. In the case of a 12-string guitar, this is certainly not necessary. Using 8 of the 12 existing tuners is pretty easy. You just immobilize the remaining four to keep them from rattling, recut the nut, and use selected bridgepin holes. It'll be flaky, but it's a start.

A mandocello is tuned CGDA. The low C note is two full steps below the normal guitar E. In other words, that course will be floppy. Cellos usually have a 27" scale.

Real Greek bouzoukis are tuned CFAD, the intervals like the top four courses of a guitar but tuned a step down. They usually have a scale of about 26.4". Other tunings on a shorter scale are possible and worth exploring.

12-strings, assuming they are "normal" in their construction, are very heavily braced, to the point of numbing the response from lighter string situations such as the ones your propose. A tuning of GDAD would be very do-able just using the top four courses of the 12 string, as-is. Not counting the neck width, they don't convert very successfully to other types of instruments. I have quite successfully converted a few Baby Taylors, with their short scale, to octave mandolins tuned GDAE. This requires amendments like Frank talks about.

How could a local luthier-made 12-string be worth so little? I bet you could cash it out to turn into a Baby Taylor pretty easy. And the BT has a lot more potential as a mandolin-family instrument.

[Michael Lewis]

Klaus, you can use heavier strings to accommodate the lower frequency. You could make it to have 4 courses of 3 strings each. One string of each course being an octave to the other two. This would require at least the nut being recut, but more probably replaced. Also the bridge would need some pins installed to guide the strings into the groupings of 3 instead of being spaced as pairs.

[Klaus Wutscher]

"First of all, there's no H in mandocello, puh-leeze." Ah, the blessings of having an email address of ...@chello.at. for years. I always thought it´s a stupid name and now it´s coming back to haunt me...
"How could a local luthier-made 12-string be worth so little?" In fact, its a fine instrument, sound is good and the craftmanship is decent. It even has a hand applied varnish (!) finish. But it apears that in the "old world", craftmanship is not appreciated as much as it used to be. I gave it to a music shop on consignment and people would prefer a cheap pac rim instrument dipped into polyurethan finish any day because they saw the brand advertised in some guitar mag. Sound? Craftmanship? Who cares!
At this point, I will probably try to string it as a bouzuki for a test drive and see if I like the sound.

Thanks for all your suggestions!