All the non-mandolins or bouzoukis, the prototypes, the one-off ideas and other suff
The Wombat fiddle

This is the fourth Wombat fiddle, my Australian variant of a Hardanger fiddle. Standard fiddle string length and four sympathetic strings under the fingerboard. All Australian timbers - King Billy pine soundboard, Tasmanian blackwood body and neck, Ring gidgee fingerboard and tailpiece. The only exotics are a maple bridge and boxwood pegs. The swirley grain of the fingerboard is quite stunning. The supplier described as 'raindrop figure'. The head is carved into a wombat. The tailpice is machined from gidgee to take eight fine tuners.

A$4500

 

 

 

 

 
The Pocket Mandolin

For a couple of years I have been thinking about how to make a very small travel mandolin. The hard thing was how to mount the tuners and still have some acoustic sound. I finally did it by mounting the tuners in a frame under the soundboard and building the body by making a laminated spruce frame to glue the sides onto. The strings pass over a 14mm aluminium rod at the end to get to the tuners. I did make a back for it which just slides on, it doesn't make a great deal of difference to the sound, and having to take it off to tune it would be a bother, so I might only offer the back, and a soundhole in the side as an option Not particularly loud, but it sounds like a mandolin. 13" scale to keep the size down to a minimum. The second thumbnail show the size in camparison to a standard mandolin. 16" long overall.