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(More customer reviews)This is a pretty good cello for the price, but it requires a bit of attention from the buyer before it's really playable. The cello arrives, as advertised, with the strings slack and the bridge un-installed -- and rightly so, it shouldn't ship under tension. Putting the bridge up is covered, well enough, in the enclosed instructions.
But, before you do that, the fingerboard and nut (the little block at the top end of the strings) can really use some final finish work. As is understandable in such an inexpensive cello, the finish work has been done quite hastily and is a bit ragged. But, it's a simple matter to get the scratch marks out of the fingerboard and nut with some sandpaper of progressively finer grits -- sanding *with* the grain! Fortunately, these two parts don't have varnish on them, so you can sand them up nicely without having to refinish anything.
That will help with the cosmetics of the cello, but it also needed some help with the playability. As with any stringed instrument, how easy it is to play varies with how high the "action" is -- the distance between the strings and the neck. If the strings are too high, it takes a lot of effort to push them down to the neck, and gets tiring and painful for the player (especially if she's only 12). The default action on this cello (and, probably, all inexpensive cellos) is way too high, and MUST be adjusted before this is a usable instrument.
This will require a tiny file to deepen the notches in the nut that the strings ride in, until the bottom of each string is about 1/32" from the fingerboard just in front of the nut. I've been playing guitar for 30 years and have encountered this issue many times before, so I had the tools to, and no qualms about, doing this myself. If you're unable to do it yourself, you will have to find someone who can, or you will be unhappy with the playability of the cello. After the notches are deep enough, the nut should be filed down so that the strings are only half-way in the notches, and half-showing above the wood -- the strings should not be buried in what will probably be very deep notches once they're properly cut.
After the nut is right, you'll probably also have to deepen the notches on the bridge, too. Install the bridge and tighten the strings up to the proper pitch (or close). I'm not a professional luthier, but I measured a friend's well-set-up cello, and matched the heights of each string above the lower-end of the fingerboard: C-string=12/32" (or 3/8"), G-string=10/32", D-string=8/32", A-string=5/32". The lower strings were pretty close already, but the highest string needed to go down quite a bit. Especially since it's the one that's played "way up the neck" the most, its action is important.
Again the strings shouldn't be "buried" in the notches, so you'll have to sand or file the bridge until the notches are tiny nicks again. This is tougher, because you can't just flatten the top of the bridge -- it was, and should stay a "knife edge", so you have to sand the side of the bridge until it tapers up to the new notches' depths. (But notice that the bridge is flat on one side, and the taper is only on the "front". Don't sand the flat side.) Again, if you're uncomfortable doing this yourself, find someone who can. I don't think it necessarily has to be a professional luthier (though that's the safest route), but someone who's used to working with wood. It's not rocket science, but it does require some care.
Also, the strings that come with these cellos aren't very good. It was certainly playable, but we replaced them with a known-brand set, and it sounds noticeably better. The old ones are in the case, though, for emergency replacements.
One more thing -- while I had the strings off, I noticed that the tuning pegs would turn easily for a quarter-turn, then get tight, then easy again. This turned out to be caused by the pegs themselves being undetectably not-quite round -- probably (and understandably) caused by the weather difference between China and Southern California. It was causing the cello to be tricky to tune, because of the non-even force required to turn the pegs.
I fixed the problem by removing each peg and sanding the part that rides inside the hole, causing a "matte finish". Then I tightly re-inserted the peg, and turned it. When removed again, I could see where the peg was tight by where the matte finish had been burnished shiny. I sanded the shiny parts, and did it again. Eventually, each peg would burnish all the way around, and also turn smoothly and consistently.
If you've read this far, you're probably thinking that this is a "no good" cello. But I actually feel that it only suffers from some understandably hasty manufacturing, and that with a little extra attention, has become a quite good cello. I feel that, at the "price" of X dollars, a few hours of my time, and a new set of strings, it's a terrific cello. If you're expecting Ready-to-Play out of the box, you won't get it at this price -- but if you're willing to touch it up a little, or have someone else do it, it's a very good "deal". Other than the details I tweaked, the main part of the cello is well made (though the varnish is a little thick), the wood is pretty, and the staining is a nice deep red-brown (we don't like the usual "orange" finishes).
By the way, the company was great to deal with, too. They "upgraded" the cello from the described "alloy tailpiece" to an real ebony one. That's probably a welcome free upgrade for most people, but I actually prefer the alloy tailpiece because it has "designed in" fine tuners, where the ebony tailpiece has those atrocious kludged-on ones. I emailed them and they immediately sent an alloy tailpiece -- we had it two days later.
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