As GLoux says, the couple of old Gibsons I had a chance to try out weren't "Loar," but they were simply a whole lot nicer than anything I can afford. I haven't had a chance to have a close-up with a Loar, and maybe at my age I shouldn't take on that much excitement.

There are no real dealers in used intruments in my area, and about the only place to get a used mandolin is at a pawn shop or antique mall. They're rare in both places, and if you find one, it's almost certain that it's there because it's unplayable. That doesn't mean it's not worth fixing, but you almost have to be an experienced player, or have some luthiery experience, to be able to tell how much fixing one will need.

There are a couple of dealers here who probably would like to have a few used ones to sell, but they don't seem to find very many - or they sell so quickly I never get to see them. That may be just because mandolins are much more popular now than they were in the past, so the few older ones are all currently in happy homes.

I tried a few Flatirons at about the time that I got my F Style, and found them decent, but several other brands looked like more for the money. Flatiron makes a number of different models, or did when I was looking, and they seemed rather "variable" to me.

My F Style is a "Vega," and it's a fairly popular brand name, but in the past had some quality problems. A particular problem was the "unusual" brand tuners they used. At about 5 to 7 years off the shelf, the buttons all simply "crumbled" and fell apart. The buttons had screws holding them on, and presumedly were meant to be replaceable, but the shaft was an odd diameter so you couldn't (*or I couldn't) get replacement buttons. I've seen at least 4 Vega F Stles in the campgrounds. It's unusual in my area to se that many of a single brand. All had new tuners, about an $80+ (US) replacement if you do it yourself. Vega appears to be using a different tuner now, so probably they've recognized the problem.

*I found one website that appeared to have the right size buttons, but the site was all in Korean(?), and I couldn't read the address to try to contact them. Vega didn't reply to my queries there.

With the variation, both in basic construction, styles, and condition, that you're likely to find, any used instrument should be evaluated at least by an experienced player if at all possible. There are a few dealerships where you may be able to rely on reputation, but not in my area.

If you are shopping around with dealers you don't absolutely know are top class, along with your experienced friend you should take a good tuner and use it to check the tuning before you start to play with it. I've found several places that deliberately "tuned down" a semitone or so (accurately, on every instrument in the place) in the belief that it will make the "action" feel better(?). In most such places, that's the only thing they know about instruments, but a mistuning can give a very deceptive impression if you don't correct it.

John