Hammertone Deluxe Mandotar Prototype Sunburst, 1990s

The Hammertone Deluxe Mandotar is a very interesting instrument. Built in George Furlanetto’s FBass workshop in Hamilton, Ontario and drawing from the 1964 – 1968 Vox Mando Guitar or Octave 12, these are like a solidbody electric 12 string with a capo at the octave fret. The size and layout is much like a mandolin.

The Hammertone seen here is a very early version and likely a production prototype, built during the 1990’s. It has no serial number or brand markings. As an early example, it blends features seen in the two later models. In particular, it uses a pair of single coil, Tele neck style pickups and the body back is Ash, not Mahogany. This instrument is in overall good condition, showing some signs of actual use. It plays quite well and has a clear, rich tone.

Sold with a Levy’s gig bag.

Still listed as in production, the Hammertone is available in two versions, Standard and Deluxe. The Standard uses a solid Ash body and single coil pickups, the Deluxe has a Mahogany body with figured Maple cap and mini-humbuckers. Both versions use a 15.75 inch scale Maple neck with Indian Rosewood fingerboard.

Here’s George Furlanetto on the Hammertone:

“Our Hammertone series of guitars, named after our beloved hometown “The Hammer”, is a 12 string electric guitar/mandolin hybrid. These little gems produce lovely shimmering chime, much like a traditional mandolin, but offer the familiarity of a 12 string guitar—simply tuned up an octave.

Each Hammertone is handcrafted in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada by our team of skilled luthiers, many of whom have honed their craft with us for 15+ years. All of our carefully selected lumber is aged in-house and never used prematurely. Whether it takes a few months or a few years, we’ll only use lumber with a moisture content of 5-7%. This means most of the moving our wood does is in our hands, not in yours. We source our tone woods from local mills, while our exotics are sourced globally and are fully CITES & LACEY compliant. To complete our builds we only use quality components with our pickups made by Kent Armstrong, bridges and tuners by Gotoh, and our custom strings sets by D’Addario.”