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The banjo reviews database is here to help educate people before they purchase an instrument. Of course, this is not meant to be a substitute for playing the instrument yourself!

7203 reviews in the archive.

Recording King: RK-80A Archtop

Submitted by rollinalong on 8/6/2008

Where Purchased: Fitch Banjos

Year Purchased: 2008
Price Paid: Don't Remember historic exchange rates / currency converter

Sound

Now that it's set up and played in a bit, it's sounding pretty good. Initially the set up was terrible on this banjo and even though it sounded "ok" it needed a bunch of work to get it as close to right as it could get. I'm rating the inital sound as an 8, shes WAY better than that now. After the set up and playing in shes more than I expected for the money.

Sound Rating: 8

Setup

Up the neck action was almost 5/16 of an inch, which is WAY too high past the 12th fret. The tone ring had major gaps between it and the rim. It took .05" shims in four places to get it to touch the rim. The heel needed to be hand worked to get the action right and the rim was out of round to the point that the tone ring had to be forced out to do the set up. I'm considering a Cumberland tail piece because the tail piece that came on this one has a buzz if the lid is completely closed.

Cliff did not set up this banjo before I got it. I won't go into details, but I got the banjo at a reduced cost. I'm sure much of this would have been corrected by Cliff had he done a set up before I got it.

Setup Rating: 4

Appearance

Fit and finish look very good. She's a beauty to be honest. There is one extremely small plating problem on the stretcher band. You seriously have to look for it to see it. No one but me will look that close cause I'm keeping her so it's a non issue.

Appearance Rating: 9

Reliability

Seems ok so far. She looks like a good one, I'd say she as good as any out there. The hardware appears to be good and tough, but who knows until it's been down a few dusty roads.

Reliability Rating: 9

Customer Service

Customer service is across the nation. I had my local set up professional set this one up because I didn't want to be without it for the amount of time it would take to get it there, set it up, and get it back. I'm giving this a 8 only because I don't know how it would be. Cliff comes very highly recommended and I tend to trust the general consensus on here. He's a good man to deal with in my experience.

Customer Service: 8

Components

She looks good and has what appears to be great quality components. Time will tell.

Components Rating: 9

Overall Comments

Now that shes set up, I enjoy her very much. For the price I paid including the set up after I received her, I'd say shes worth every cent and more.

Overall Rating: 9

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