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Is there much experimentation with different top, B/S woods for building mandos. Body depth?
I ask, because, for me, the sound of the mando, seems somewhat truncated ie lacks fullness of the sound. I notice earlier and euro. mandos have deeper bodies and the sound seems richer, fuller-or, is this the sound Americans wanted from Mando? Why?
This question parallels and is very similar to differences in sound between pedal steele and dobro. I love the sound of the dobro but sometime the sound of the petal sounds, to me, like fingernails on the blackboard.
Were these sounds sought to duplicate a sound from an instrument used in 'the old country'?

The flat top mando has a tone with lots of over-tones in it. It can be described a guitar like. The arch top mandolin, either A or F style, has a deeper tone that seems to put more energy into the fundemental as opposed to the harmonics.

Yes, you are right. The tone of the archtop American mandolins is intentional. I believe that the intent is to reduce the complexity of the tone. An arch top mandoling will cut through the crowd of sound in an ensamble much better than a flat top. I don't think they were trying to mimic that sound of any other instrument.

Bob,

Check in at Mandolincafe.com and look around the builders forum there. There are some past threads about a new builder who is making a mando using carbon fibre for the whole instrument. There are even some pictures and soundclips. I think it's called a New Millennium or NewMAD.

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Chris Nielsen
Soquel, CA.