I looked at Mr. Philips' site. They look wonderful, but are out of my price range. I am still converting violins and violas, rather than making new instruments.

The bad point about conversions is that the instruments need modification, and then still are not optimized for the lower tones.

The good points are that I can afford to play around with them, and by judicious selection of the used instrument to be converted, I can get a stable, nice sounding instrument without waiting 20 years for the wood to age! Best conversions so far have been pre-war German instruments- 80 years seems like enough time ( or else the bad ones are all thrown away!)