I have an earlier version of the same model that I bought used a couple of years ago.
I had to do a bit of work on it, but once I did, I was pretty happy with it. I would suggest replacing the cheap wooden nut with a bone nut at some
point. (I got one from Yaron Naor--you can also order from him on eBay.) I also bored out some of the peg holes a bit more with a reamer and used some
peg compound to improve their fit. At first I thought I might need to replace the pegs, but now they hold their tuning incredibly well.
On my oud, the fingerboard is made of zan wood, which is softer than ebony. The previous owner of mine had left large gouges under the rast (middle C)
and jaharkah (F) notes. I filled these with epoxy then planed the fingerboard and covered it with a couple of coats of thin epoxy, similar to what
some fretless bassists do. I wound not necessarily recommend doing this yourself, and I don't think I'd do it again, but in my case, I got lucky and
the thing's hard as a rock now with no visible signs of wear.
The fingerboard on yours looks pretty similar, but it's hard to tell if it's the same wood. One less intense and invasive thing that might help the
longevity of the fingerboard is to give it a coat of tung oil in a few months when you change the strings and then periodically touch it up with
subsequent string changes. There are some helpful threads on the forum with advice for how to do this.
It's no vintage Nahat, but all in all, it's a good instrument for the price if you're prepared to do a bit of work on it. I just put a set of Pyramid
lute strings on mine (courtesy of the Oudstrings.com blowout sale), and I'm very happy with how it sounds.
Feel free to send me a message if you have any questions. I'm sure your oud teacher will also be helpful in getting it set up. (Hopefully you've found
one of those as well.)
Good luck! |