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Joined:
August 2004
Posts: 709
Location: Germany | On closer inspection of my Adamas guitars I realized that the textured tops look different. Obviously they used different molds in the top production process over time.
I also inspected the Adamas guitar pictures on Jerome's website and I think there were basically three different types with slight variations (serial# are ballpark estimate):
Type I: from the beginning to ca. serial #1500, groove-shaped texture
Type II: from ca. #1500 to ca. #2500, irregular lunar crater-shaped texture
Type I again: from ca. #2500 to ca. #4000, groove-shaped texture, rounded shape
Type III: from ca. #4000 until now, regular lunar crater-shaped texture
I don't think there is too much influence of the texture type in the guitar's sound. All my Adamas guitars sound a little bit different but there doesn't seem to be a correlation with the texture type. For instance #47RI and OFC guitar both have type III texture but sound perceptible different.
Type II guitars seem to be quite rare. I only found a few of them on Jerome's site, Mike\'s 1687-7 is one.
Karl |
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Joined:
July 2002
Posts: 1900
| Those are the Adamas I tops, right? So, I'm assuming there was a distinct difference with the SMT and CVT tops on the Adamas II. |
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Posts: 5563
Location: Blue Ridge Mountains | Karl, great work! I also have noticed the difference's in the various one's that I've owned...I have never seen one quite like my '81 1687-7...interesting...I'm assuming that presses or molds are used to form the sandwich of graphite/birch/graphite...I have seen that the very early tops (type I) do have a tendency to delaminate or get air bubbles esp. around the epi's...perhaps this was meant to stop that...in any event it's very interesting.
Steve, yes, just Adamas I's and perhaps Adamas II's... |
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April 2008
Posts: 2336
Location: Brighty in Blighty | You forgot the 1680 ;)
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Joined:
August 2004
Posts: 709
Location: Germany | My typing is only related to the textured Adamas I and II tops.
Mike, I'v always wondered where the delamination and/or bubbles come frome. The worst I've ever seen is this AI in the #500-range:
It shows delamination of the darker burst color as well as the blue base color. Partially you can even see the black carbon fibres. Your explanation makes sense to me. But maybe it was not a texture issue but just a problem with the paint adhesion.
Rupert, great pics. The 1680 structure seems to be completely different from the AIs and IIs.
Karl |
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Different Adamas textured top patterns over the time
