Official Luthiers Forum!

Al-you amaze me!
How do you remember all this tech. ??

Last year at the Montreal show i was next to Aljandro Cervantes!
He is one great guitarist!
I asked him to play my guitars!
After a few minutes he says-your back is to loose-it's killing your guitars!!
I make my backs thicker & stiffer than most-so this was a surprise!

He says i leave them as thick as i can!
because it makes a well made top sound great-more volume-better responce!

So he played one of his guitars with a 4mm thick back and it was louder-better trebles-and a rich bass!
Our top thickness -body size -depth & bracing were almost an exact
copy of each others guitars!!
It was a spruce & rosewood guitar with a raised f.b.!

So I'm saying to myself-WHEW!

It was a great demonstration of the difference between a loose (not by much)
back and a very stiff one!

To me -it was a better sounding guitar!
I do not make guitars for me-BUT for players !
If I like a certain responce it's not a given players will!

Just some ramblings!

Mike

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Mike Collins

One of the more interesting and surprising guitars I've heard was built by a local friend of mine with cherry back and sides and a freakin' floor joist running down the middle of the back. Where you'd expect to see a thin cross-grain back graft, there was this huge beam with its grain running lengthwise. The guitar was an SJ of sorts. It sounded GREAT. Loud, big, delicious sound, very well balanced. It sounded great when he played it across the room from me, and it sounded great when I played it myself.

Disclaimer: we were in the assembly room in my shop, which is a relatively small room with a concrete floor and sheetrock walls... but we were also playing and listening to several guitars, and this was the one that made you go, "WOW!"

Just another inconclusive observation...

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Todd Rose
Ithaca, NY

https://www.dreamingrosesecobnb.com/todds-art-music

https://www.facebook.com/ToddRoseGuitars/

I know I am beginning to rethink all this talk about bracing .. one of the best sounding guitars in the acoustic listening session ,at the GAL was a j-200 ,what most here would consider severly over braced, double x bracing ( it actualy had five x's in the system )top. And the back had ladder bracing that looked like 1" dowels cut in half and glued to the back.yet the guitar sounded very good with a strong rumbly bass. go figure ! Jody