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Location: Thredbo, NSW, Australia | Looking very, very good to me Dan! |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | arumako - 2017-02-21 7:54 PM
Forgive me Mr. Savage, I am afraid I must contend with your definition of "perfect."
Jeez, Dan you're too hard on your self! 
Ha ha!
When I say 'perfect', I meant that I used a hand-drill instead of the drill press so the holes aren't perpendicular to the surface of the top. Since the hand-drill wasn't perpendicular, it caused the holes to drift a little and were slightly off-center to what they should have been.
In the grand scheme of things these little flaws won't matter as the main goal of this exercise was to demonstrate to myself how a torrefied-top Elite sounds. (Wanna buy a guitar? LOL!) |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Thanks, Mike.
Thanks, Paul. |
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Location: Muenster/Germany | I once made experiments with an Adamas guitar that had no soundholes on the lower bout and I simply added some. I found out that 2 of the middle-sized holes and 5 of the small ones finally gave the best results. I would ecourage you to try one more of the greater ones and 2 of the small ones . More soundholes in the lower bout make the guitar fuller in the lower mid-range. Just remember the Tony Rice guitars by Martin or Santa cruz, they have bigger soundholes, too. And the Marcel Dadi Adamas custom! |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Thanks for the info, DetlefMichel.
I'm not sure where on the guitar you're describing when you write, 'lower bout'.
To me, the lower bout is the area between the bridge and strap button. The upper bout is the area between the bridge and the neck joint.
The upper and lower bouts are then divided by the center line of the guitar into bass side and treble side. |
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Location: Yokohama, Japan | DanSavage - 2017-02-21 12:56 PM
...(Wanna buy a guitar? LOL!)
LOL! As the immortal Vizzini said, "Hahahaha hahahaha hahahaha...ha" To that, I would add "GAAAAAAAAAS!"
Then I hear a voice inside my head saying, "Wait-a-minute...is he being serious? But he's building 4 of them. Which do you think he's talking about?"
To which I answer, "I don't know. Do you think I should ask?"
Then another voice cries out, "No! Don't ask! Don't ask!" To which another voice responds to the other voice saying, "Shut-up over there...come on Ken, of course you should ask!"
Hearing voices telling me to buy guitars... Perhaps early signs of OFC-itis? 
Edited by arumako 2017-02-22 5:57 PM
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Location: When?? | @arumako -->Hearing voices telling me to buy guitars"<--
Early sign?? Not so sure. I've been hearing them since I was about nine. |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | arumako - 2017-02-22 3:56 PM
Perhaps early signs of OFC-itis?
No. OFC-mania...  |
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Location: Yokohama, Japan | Love O Fair - 2017-02-22 12:13 PM
@arumako -->Hearing voices telling me to buy guitars"<--
Early sign?? Not so sure. I've been hearing them since I was about nine.
WOW Love O Fair, you've had an early start into the world of GAS! LOL...
DanSavage - 2017-02-22 12:39 PM
No. OFC-mania...
Yes, Yes, OFC-mania. Much, much better articulation. Thanks Dan. Being in Japan, my options are a bit limited, but did you have anything specific in mind? |
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Location: Muenster/Germany | DanSavage - 2017-02-22 8:06 PM
Thanks for the info, DetlefMichel.
I'm not sure where on the guitar you're describing when you write, 'lower bout'.
To me, the lower bout is the area between the bridge and strap button. The upper bout is the area between the bridge and the neck joint.
The upper and lower bouts are then divided by the center line of the guitar into bass side and treble side.
I´m sorry, I meant the treble side of the upper bout then. I forgot to take pics of that guitar and it has a new owner now...Sometimes it´s hard to discuss here in a foreign language. |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | No problemo. Your English is much better than my German. LOL!
When I owned my 2078 TX, I noticed that it had very strong bass. Part of this can be attributed to the deep contour bowl. But, the Elite T line of guitars also don't have any holes in the treble bout.
After some consideration I decided to add the standard Elite holes to the that side so that the lack of sound holes would not suppress the treble response of the guitar.
I had this bowl laying around gathering dust. When I had the chance to acquire the 1537 neck I decided to bash together this guitar so I could hear how the quintad braces sound on a torrefied top. I'm not a big fan of cutaway guitars because, IMO, it limits the acoustic balance of the sound it puts out, but this should give me a pretty good idea whether building an Elite-style top worth the extra work.
I can say for sure that any Elites I do in the future will not have the full-width cross-grain reinforcements, but will have only the cross-grain on the area over the sound hole outside the braces.
From a production standpoint, it's a pain in the neck to have full-width doublers.
Edited by DanSavage 2017-02-23 8:52 AM
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Location: SoCal | Dan, it's always fun when you get hot on your projects! |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Thanks, Paul. |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Braces glued down. I can say 'never again' will I use the full-width cross-grain. Taking a 1/32" notch out of the underside of the braces was a major PITA. I even had to re-do one of the braces. It would have been much easier to not have to do that. And, there's no real benefit as the only purpose of the cross-grain is to keep the webs between the holes from splitting out. I can see why the factory did away with this and went to small patches over the sound holes.
Because the upper ends of the braces are so tall, I decided to make a jig to keep them more or less square while the gobars are clamping them in place. The main thing is to keep them from flopping over to the side.
I'll let these dry 24 hours, then pull the top out of the gobar deck. 
Next job is to start gluing the tops to the bowls.
Edited by DanSavage 2017-02-23 4:55 PM
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Location: Indiana | Very clean. Waiting with bated breath to hear your results. Be interesting to hear Beal's memories of the original process. After all, you are reverse engineering here. Maybe they began using fiberglass in those areas and found it varied in thickness too much to make bracing fabrication a bigger PITA than using uniform plywood. Anyway, carry on, Dan. Looking great.
Edited by Jonmark Stone 2017-02-23 10:24 PM
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Location: Tuscany, Italy | Bravo Dan ! |
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Location: Muenster/Germany | DanSavage - 2017-02-23 3:50 PM
I'm not a big fan of cutaway guitars because, IMO, it limits the acoustic balance of the sound it puts out, but this should give me a pretty good idea whether building an Elite-style top worth the extra work.
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I disagree. Any guitar, if it´s well built, will have no loss of sound if it has a cutaway. I had a custom legend cutaway that a huge potential (and I only sold it because of the extreme V shape of the neck), but it was definetely the most sonorous of my 4 cl´s.
I have 3 luthier-built guitars with cutaways, all of them with great tone. And doesn´t the Adamas guitar sound so good because the soundholes are placed in an area of the guitar top where no great vibrations are to be expected?
The only exception may be very small guitars with low body depth, they may suffer from a lack of resonant chamber. But I believe most luthiers would answer even this back.
But I think that there may be an other problem with cutaways, especially with 12string guitars. The structural strength of the treble side of the body. I saw some guitars with completely distorted bodies. My hand-made 12string guitar has a 12fret neck and a small ! cutaway only to be able to reach the 12th fret with a slide when played with the ring finger. Most cutaways are too big, more than really necessary.
I would only fully agree that non-cutaway guitars simply look better.
But now I better leave you alone and let you work...;-) |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Thanks, Jonmark & Riccardo.
I'm aiming to get these guitars done by the end of March, so it shouldn't be too much longer before we'll be able to hear how all these sound. |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | DetlefMichel - 2017-02-24 2:48 AM
I disagree. Any guitar, if it´s well built, will have no loss of sound if it has a cutaway. I had a custom legend cutaway that a huge potential (and I only sold it because of the extreme V shape of the neck), but it was definetely the most sonorous of my 4 cl´s.
I have 3 luthier-built guitars with cutaways, all of them with great tone. And doesn´t the Adamas guitar sound so good because the soundholes are placed in an area of the guitar top where no great vibrations are to be expected?
The only exception may be very small guitars with low body depth, they may suffer from a lack of resonant chamber. But I believe most luthiers would answer even this back.
But I think that there may be an other problem with cutaways, especially with 12string guitars. The structural strength of the treble side of the body. I saw some guitars with completely distorted bodies. My hand-made 12string guitar has a 12fret neck and a small ! cutaway only to be able to reach the 12th fret with a slide when played with the ring finger. Most cutaways are too big, more than really necessary.
I would only fully agree that non-cutaway guitars simply look better.
But now I better leave you alone and let you work...;-)
Ha ha! That's okay. I have lots of down-time while the glue dries to discuss guitar theory. :D
Here's a link to a video where two otherwise identical guitars (is there really any such thing?) are played, one a full-body and the other a cutaway.Cutaway vs Non-Cutaway: Does it affect the sound? Unless the volume of the body is increased on the cutaway guitar, it will have a tone that emphesizes the mid- to -high range. (Helmholtz resonance) Since most deep-bowl Ovation guitars utilize the same basic molded bowl, the one with a cutaway will have decreased volume that causes a shift in the tone. The full-body will have a deeper, more rounded (no pun intended) tone. Naturally, there are other factors that affect tone, including sound hole size, sound board thickness, brace pattern, etc. But, for two otherwise identical guitars, such as our Ovations, the one with more body volume will have a deeper, more rounded tone. The Adamas got it's sound hole locations for two reasons: Increased stiffness between the bridge and the neck. This allows for lighter braces because they don't have to keep the sound board from distorting due to the center hole. The lighter braces allow the sound board to flex more which increases volume. (amplitude) One of the reasons why one guitar might sound better than an otherwise identical guitar has a lot to do with the wood, itself. When my daughter was shopping for a guitar we tried two Epiphones that were the same model, same finish, both brand new. One sounded better than the other and that's the one I recommended she buy. WRT appearance, you and I are in complete agreement. A full-body guitar looks better. :D
Edited by DanSavage 2017-02-24 9:39 AM
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Location: Yokohama, Japan | Jonmark Stone - 2017-02-23 11:57 AM
Very clean. Waiting with bated breath to hear your results.
+1 |
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Location: Muenster/Germany | Ok that video was impressive. If you compare otherwise identical guitars the non-cutaway is obviously the one I would choose.
(But every luthier can built a cutaway guitar with no sound compromises, which will then not be identical with non-cutaway guitars.)
And...I´ve been telling it ever since: Sunbursts are better!! |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | DetlefMichel - 2017-02-24 8:57 AM
Ok that video was impressive. If you compare otherwise identical guitars the non-cutaway is obviously the one I would choose.
(But every luthier can built a cutaway guitar with no sound compromises, which will then not be identical with non-cutaway guitars. )
And...I´ve been telling it ever since: Sunbursts are better!!
True. But, as you say, then they're not identical.
Ha ha! I think you're right. It's the sunburst! LOL!
Just for the fun of it I did some math comparing the area of the sound holes between the center hole style and the Elite style. (CAD makes this kind of stuff really easy)
1) Center hole: 4" diameter, 12.56 sq. in.
2) Full body Elite: 11.27 sq. in.
3) Cutaway Elite, bass & treble holes: 7.126 sq. in.
4) Cutaway Elite, bass-only holes: 5.63 sq. in.
What this is telling me is that less sound hole area of the Elite style could balance out the tone of the guitar to account for the loss of volume of the cutaway guitar. Could. Not does, but could. |
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Location: Boise, Idaho | Thanks for the numbers, Dan. I've always liked the sound of the center hole Ovations over the Elites. Now I have some numbers to explain my preference. I also like the deep bowl over the contour bowl. Can you come up with some numbers to explain that? |
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Location: Pueblo West, CO | Hi Mark,
Thanks. What is it you like about the deep bowl vs. contour? |
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Location: When?? | @Dan -->What this is telling me is that less sound hole area of the Elite style could balance out the tone of the guitar to account for the loss of volume of the cutaway guitar. Could. Not does, but could."<--
If you actually have the sample guitars on hand you can record them each in the same fixed environment and input values, then expand out the waveform (both directions) to closely inspect the differences. I've found this to be helpful on various instruments and ambient sounds, though keep in mind that with guitars it involves the human factor of plucking/strumming with equal force and sustain during each sample for the most accurate readings. You can also record with various input values and environments within a wide range desired sampling criteria. I have to wonder how we ever survived the old days with nothing but green scopes and curves! |
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???? 1778T(orrified)...
