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 Of Martins...Mojo...and Factory Tours
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| Forums Archive -> The Vault: 2004-2005 | Message format | |
Slipkid |
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Joined: September 2003 Posts: 9301 Location: south east Michigan | BrianT and I made the most of our little pilgrimage out east. On the way to the OFC Tour we hit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the Martin Guitar Factory Tour. It's really unfair to compare the two factory tours....but I will anyway! These comparisons are so unfair but just concider the bias source. (Before I go much further I just want to say that BrianT has an absolute knockout D-28. A fantastic looking and sounding guitar that I would be proud to own) Martin does these tours every day so I imagine they become rather routine to the tour guides and employees. Yes, just like at Disneyworld, the tour ends at the gift shop. I don't mind that. If Ovation had a gift shop I would have dropped a few bucks myself. At the Martin tour they had 3 guitars you could play. Two run of the mill, very out of tune full size models and a travel size Martin that was the worst example of that guitar that I have ever played. I won't go into what we got to play with at the OFC tour. You already know. At the Martin tour we were walked through various departments. One guy was robotically putting strips of rosewood into a machine that formed the sides. Others glued bracing and stained necks. At all times we were told to stay in between the lines of the walkway. At the Ovation Tour we could look right over the employees shoulder. Ask them questions. Make comments. We could get up close and personal with the machinery. At time the Martin Tour would stop in front of a wall of pictures showing you part of the process. We walked down a hallway where we could look down on about 10,000 square feet of automated machinery spitting out parts. I can tell you, IMHO, that Ovation has at least as much "hands on" craftsmanship as Martin. The robot that polishes guitars:  This beast picks up a body, runs it across massive polishing wheels in two directions, and sets it back down. The man pictured to the left was so entranced that he broke the rules, left the safety of the yellow lines, and wound up getting his head to close to the wheel. This was hanging on the wall on our way out. Comments?  I'm sure we did not see the best things that Martin has to offer. I'm sure that there is a custom shop somewhere in that building that would be fasincating. But we were just another group of monkeys being led around. Mojo..... This was the first guitar factory I had ever seen. I expected to come away rather giddy and light headed. However, I found that I left with less mojo rather than more. Again...It is unfair to compare the two tours. They are apples and oranges, Celebrities and Adamas, Al & Cliff.  | ||
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| Standingovation |
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Joined: June 2002 Posts: 6197 Location: Phoenix AZ | |||
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| Slipkid |
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Joined: September 2003 Posts: 9301 Location: south east Michigan | |||
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| Jeff W. |
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| Old Applause Owner |
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| cruster |
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| BrianT |
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| Jeff W. |
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| schroeder |
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| Jeff W. |
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| Capo Guy |
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Joined: December 2004 Posts: 4394 Location: East Tennessee | |||
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| Jeff W. |
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| Waskel |
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Joined: February 2005 Posts: 11840 Location: closely held secret | |||
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| schroeder |
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