Buckeye Custom 12" WL Reviews

Buckeye Custom 12" WL submitted 7/15/2008 Submitter tridentum (see all reviews from this person) Where Purchased Directly from Greg Year Purchased 2008 Price Paid 1550 ($US) Sound When I first got the banjo I swapped Greg's bridge for a Moon light. The head has settled in now and after some tweaking it is considerably tighter than it was when the banjo arrived last summer. The light Moon bridge was really not holding up in the lower end as the humidity started dropping this fall. So I'm back to using Greg's proprietary bridge, and all is well. Such is life with a skin head. It's still a boomer with a great WL sound. The skin head provides a really nice balance of treble and bass, but with the seasonal changes in Wisconsin playing havoc with tension I may look to a Renaissance head after this winter. Very good clarity and punch. Fourth string booms. Excellent sound that continues to improve over time. Sound Rating 9 Setup Action was set up perfectly and this banjo is a joy to play. I made some significant changes to set up to suit my personal taste and the skin head has finally settled in for the winter. Greg sets them up nicely but with a skin head you're going to spend some time in the first few days tweaking. I did swap out his bridge as it appeared to choke off some of the sound. and response - at least to my ear, but now I am back to it as the head has tightened to a point where a light bridge was counterproductive. Anyway, I didn't need to change much to move it along - some head adjustment and I ditched the light gauge strings for Ome heavies. Any banjo needs set up adjustments after a trip in the mail and especially one with a skin head. Greg had it set up well but my adjustments brought it in line with the sound I was looking for. Rating set up is almost pointless until you've played the thing for about a year. Most banjo players prefer to do their own set up. Setup Rating 9 Appearance An absolute beauty. We went with dark-stained walnut no inlay (by the way, Greg does some beautiful inlay work). Square headstock with routed corners, walnut verneer on the rim and a beautifull ogee at the 5th string; black knobbed tuners. All of the work is flawless. Can't say enough about the neck. Greg's stuff really reminds one of the classic open backs of the late 19th and early 20th century. Appearance Rating 10 Reliability Solid banjo, built well, with good components. Should be a horse. Reliability Rating 10 Customer Service Greg is a fine banjo maker and a swell guy. Communicates well and understands what you want. Plus he tosses in a free t-shirt with your banjo. Customer Service 10 Components All comnponents are of the highest quality. Love the Gotoh tuners. Components Rating 10 Overall Comments Another small-shop banjo maker who is really making a name for himself. This must be the golden age of old time banjo making because there are a host of these guys out there. What separates Greg is his customer service and price range. A custom 12" WL for under $2K is unheard of among the established makers, and Greg's work is outstanding. Do yourself a favor - check out his website and see what he is doing. You cannot go wrong with a Buckeye banjo. Excellent workmanship, great sound at an outstanding price. Well done, Greg! I've had it for several months now and it keeps getting better. Overall Rating 10