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A question for the archtop builders.
The photo below is my Triggs guitar. It is basically an L4 with carved top and carved back. The top has a Florentine cutaway.
The binding within the cutaway has to be taller / thicker as it is following the carved arches of the top and back. It would appear that the plates were carved as a complete, and then the cutaways were made after the top and back were carved. This makes sense. However, the edge of the cutaway no longer has a recurve; it went with the cutaway pieces.
Would there be an advantage to incorporating the recurve along the cutaway? Does anyone do so?
Thanks!
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01-31-2025 03:02 PM
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Originally Posted by Betz
A question for the archtop builders.
The photo below is my Triggs guitar. It is basically an L4 with carved top and carved back. The top has a Florentine cutaway.
The binding within the cutaway has to be taller / thicker as it is following the carved arches of the top and back. It would appear that the plates were carved as a complete, and then the cutaways were made after the top and back were carved. This makes sense. However, the edge of the cutaway no longer has a recurve; it went with the cutaway pieces.
Would there be an advantage to incorporating the recurve along the cutaway? Does anyone do so?
Thanks!
Yes, carving the plates as a complete, and then making the cutaways after the top and back were carved, makes sense - due to the time saved during the building. The guitar maker or company saves the laborious task of dealing with the fundamentally different shapes of the symmetrical and asymmetrical upper bouts. Only one single mold is necessary for this American construction. Gibson probably set this "standard" that still prevails today - an acoustician like Lloyd Loar would probably be a little horrified...
The pleasing appearance of the necessary fat "hump-binding" is debatable. On my Stromberg Master 400 cutaway copy, Triggs left the binding straight or narrow and levelled out the required height with two attached wooden strips on top of the sides (a pic is hidden somewhere in the depths of this forum). This glue joint is not only visible, but also works considerably due to fluctuations in relative humidity, so it is understandable that he has now defused this tricky spot with the official high binding on the cutaway cutout that seems to be common in the US archtop guitar world.
When it comes to the optimum acoustic sound of an asymmetrical archtop guitar, reasonable people can hardly resist the argument of the specially worked and "smoothed out" plate transitions around the cutaway horn. The so-called figure-of-eight (the recurve on the edge of carved plates) is also continued around the cutaway.
If you think you can do without this figure, well, then you probably build electric guitars where the recurve and the design around the cutaway are no longer of any particular importance. Such instruments can certainly be built quite sophisticatedly and beautifully - like even some non-arched solid-body guitars are - but they cannot compare with the acoustic properties and tone that can only be achieved with fine acoustic archtops. Some will dismiss this and talk about pure psychoacoustics, which - like everything psychological surrounding people - always plays a role. The subtleties of this sound are perhaps more physically felt by the player than heard, but anyone who has encountered it knows what it is all about.
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Yeah, what he said.
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Well, Ol’ Fret, I had to read your post three times before I finally got it. On an acoustic archtop (like the beautiful one you posted) you are already taking a ‘hit’ with a cutaway, so minimize the impact with the figure-of-eight recurve. On an electric (like my Triggs) the impact is much less critical so keep the smooth curve and make it strong (and pretty).
Thank you (and HT) for the education!
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For some there is a difference between an (electrified) acoustic archtop and an electric archtop looking like an (electrified) acoustic - nothing bad at all with the latter, if that is what you want.
It is not easy to understand on the "cutaway_cut_after_plate_carving" models, why the top and back around the cutaway (which are standing further apart) or the whole treble side upper bout should be supposed to be stiffer.
Some "cutaway_cut_before_plate_carving" guitars with Venetian cutaway do even have a neck block which is extended right into the cutaway shape, making them probably stiffer than any Florentine cutaway models.
Without the "hump binding" you might lose a little body volume as a result, but this could easily be compensated for by slightly higher sides. Artur Lang has developed a unique solution here, which is not easy to spot even for trained eyes... the complaints of some players that a symmetrical body shape must fundamentally be superior in terms of sound in comparison to the same model with a cutaway can be significantly reduced with that. By extending the recurve around the cutaway area the top as the main sound generator is able to move more freely, even Alan Carruth talked once about the analogy of a loudspeaker cone. If that generator shows an almost even thickness without much gradation, or is comparably thin carved (i. e., even a recurve wouldn't make much sense anymore), the tone timbre and sound characteristics will be basically different.
Here a Triggs from 2001, in which a binding of constant height was used around the cutaway. The top and back plates are therefore clearly still visible at the cutaway sides.
My red arrows indicate another problem, though much less visible on the beautifully radially cut spruce top than on the back, both in the area of the glue joint and the binding: the concerned areas have not only affected the finish, but the wood joints are instable or partially open and moving due to relative humidity changes. The explanation why the back moves around so much more: it is made of American maple with a wild, nice-looking figure, but cut tangentially or diagonally to the growth lines, by which wood shrinks/extends much more than in radial direction.
With CNC technology, it should be easy to roughly route the different, left and right, plate halves of asymmetrical guitars.
The guitar makers of the mechanical duplicarver era managed to do so:
below, NOS rough plates for a late Roger Super natural (labeled by Wenzel Rossmeisl himself), German-Carve technique with the Roger-typical maximum arch height of 13-14mm (always measured from the glue joint).
Then, NOS Lang plates, which also illustrate the given asymmetry of the respective plate halves; max. arching height 18 to 20mm. There's no "official" archtop plate height categorization, so I like to divide the arching heights into three categories: up to 15mm, 16 to 20mm, and over 20mm. In addition to the arching curves and the corresponding plate thickness or gradation, the arching heights are very influential on the intended sound characteristics.
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Over and above the ultimate sonic qualities of the construction, the flowing complexity of the curves is beautiful in and of itself.
As for the humped binding for some guitars at the cutaway, this was noted in D'Angelico guitars. Jimmy D'Aquisto, later in life, said that John didn't want to make new patterns, so he just carved the top the same way for a cutaway or non-cutaway instrument, bridging the resulting gap with binding. Gibson did something similar. When Johnny Smith shopped his guitar design to Guild, the production manager did not want to do it that way. They wanted to carve the top taking the cutaway into account; Johnny pulled his endorsement from Guild as a result of this because he thought that D'Angelico's way was the correct way. Gibson was willing to do it that way. Much later in life, he allowed as this position was incorrect and that the Guild instrument was fine.
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Hello, archtop builder here.
I am quite sure that Triggs’ choice is about “authenticity” and respecting tradition, more than cutting corners on working hours.
Does that area influences the sound? Yes and no.
Obviously, every single area of the instrument, especially if acoustic, has an influence on sound.
The guitar is a complex coupled system, and clearly the resulting physical behavior is given by the “sum” of every individual vibration/behavior.
Anyway, is that missing recurve part enough to modify the sound in a perceivable way? The curves of the carve there are so steep that that area is very rigid by itself, even with a recurve.
That said, I prefer to build it with a recurve and even-height bindings - although minimal, I think that it will have a sonic influence, even though maybe not immediately perceivable.
Also, removing useless weight from the table will only have benefits.
Furthermore, I find it more aesthetically pleasing and more “fluid”, both for the binding with the same size and for the evenness of the recurve.
This is from one I’m actually building:
From this you can better see the recurve:
This it just the way I like to do, but I think Triggs way has its own sense too, especially thinking about following the style of D’Angelico and Gibson.
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Guild Johnny Smith (Artist) Award vs Gibson Johnny Smith.
In the end, Guild was right.
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So what would one see under the wide binding in the cutaway? - a thinly carved top and back and profiled 'wings' added to the bent side piece? Thanks Originally Posted by Ol' Fret
Yes, carving the plates as a complete, and then making the cutaways after the top and back were carved, makes sense - due to the time saved during the building. The guitar maker or company saves the laborious task of dealing with the fundamentally different shapes of the symmetrical and asymmetrical upper bouts. Only one single mold is necessary for this American construction. Gibson probably set this "standard" that still prevails today - an acoustician like Lloyd Loar would probably be a little horrified...
The pleasing appearance of the necessary fat "hump-binding" is debatable. On my Stromberg Master 400 cutaway copy, Triggs left the binding straight or narrow and levelled out the required height with two attached wooden strips on top of the sides (a pic is hidden somewhere in the depths of this forum). This glue joint is not only visible, but also works considerably due to fluctuations in relative humidity, so it is understandable that he has now defused this tricky spot with the official high binding on the cutaway cutout that seems to be common in the US archtop guitar world.
When it comes to the optimum acoustic sound of an asymmetrical archtop guitar, reasonable people can hardly resist the argument of the specially worked and "smoothed out" plate transitions around the cutaway horn. The so-called figure-of-eight (the recurve on the edge of carved plates) is also continued around the cutaway.
If you think you can do without this figure, well, then you probably build electric guitars where the recurve and the design around the cutaway are no longer of any particular importance. Such instruments can certainly be built quite sophisticatedly and beautifully - like even some non-arched solid-body guitars are - but they cannot compare with the acoustic properties and tone that can only be achieved with fine acoustic archtops. Some will dismiss this and talk about pure psychoacoustics, which - like everything psychological surrounding people - always plays a role. The subtleties of this sound are perhaps more physically felt by the player than heard, but anyone who has encountered it knows what it is all about.
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In comparison to the vast majority of acoustic archtops made across the Atlantic nothing on Artur Lang's carved top and back plates was ever "thinly carved". Except for the recurve which by function has to be carved thinner. Originally Posted by garybaldy
What do you mean with "wide binding in the cutaway"? The tortoise binding around the edges? It is not wide or tall in comparison to those used on many American archtops.
<< Profiled 'wings' added to the bent side piece >>.
I'm sorry, my luthier-related imagination is failing right now! I'm always keen to know what good ideas Lang might have missed - like to extend?
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I'm referring to the wide binding in Betz's photo in post #1. I thought you would probably know. Thanks Originally Posted by Ol' Fret
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Well, I can't say for sure what is under the wide binding of Betz's Triggs. Originally Posted by garybaldy
However, I strongly suspect that — as is common in American making of asymmetrical archtop guitars — the plates in the cutaway area were left very thick and then simply cut off without any smooth transition and recurve. This was probably also the reason why the arching curves of American guitars tend to taper off very flatly towards the neck and cutaway, almost like on flattop guitars. This also allowed the fretboard / neck extension to be glued to the top in its full length. With the top's arched shape and the addition of a recurve adjusted to the cutaway transition, this would have been very difficult to accomplish. However, gluing the whole area of the neck extension - which extends quite beyond the neck block - to the top could hinder some nice vibrations. Flattops guitars with their delicate thin tops could generally profit by such an additional longitudinal reinforcement; on acoustic guitars with a relatively rigid and arched top - that nevertheless must vibrate - it could be counterproductive.
This is clearly evident on my Triggs, which still features a binding that runs all the way around, evenly thick. For illustrative purposes, I've extended some of the visible vertical growth rings of the spruce top upwards in red in the photo, where they are, of course, invisible under the binding. Similarly, the maple back in the cutaway was cut to a similar thickness.
I can only guess why Gibson did what German guitar makers basically dislike(d). Maybe some have better explanations; here is my attempt:
The symmetrical archtops of the late 1930s, after the Depression, certainly sold well. Gibson therefore had a large stock of carved tops and backs. However, when they introduced the Premier (cutaway) models around 1939, a basic design that players perceived as more functional and therefore more valuable, they were left with a lot of pre-routed symmetrical plates. Btw., cutaway models were not new; Epiphone, Kay and some others had already offered guitars with a cutaway.
Soon the players lusted for the novelty of cutaway models. What to do with the precious stock of carved symmetrical plates? Creating new routing templates obviously seemed too laborious; also, the double number of routing templates would have had to be made, at least one each for the top and the back; then, the bass and the treble plate halves had to sport different arching shapes and heights. Historically, global political turmoil had been developing; the air soon smelled of war. So Gibson simply changed these existing symmetrical plates into asymmetrical ones, and found a new use for them. After the war, this process was no longer refined. Manufacturers abandoned it for cost reasons, and players didn't care anyway, so people got used to this old, yet - for European eyes - somewhat crude process. And after that, it became a hallmark of "vintage" for many.Last edited by Ol' Fret; 04-08-2025 at 07:25 PM.
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Doc, not quite: Originally Posted by Ol' Fret
1-Gibson non-cutaway archtops:
-these guitars have recurve all around their perimeters. The carving on the undersides of the plates is symmetrical.
2-early Gibson cutaway carved archtop, with a "P" designation for Premier, designating a cutaway:
-these guitars have recurve all around their perimeters. Gibson efficiently machine-carved their tops and backs as non-cutaway plates, with extra wood on the undersides of the plates, so that the same plates could be used for either standard non-cutaway or Premier guitars. The plates could be trimmed for cutaways, then the outer surfaces hand carved down to the binding, so that uniformly thin binding could be used all around the bodies. These instruments are characterized by crude hand-carving of their plates at the cutaway area.
Alternatively, if the guitars were non-cutaway instruments, the extra wood on the undersides of the plates could easily be removed. The outer surfaces of the plates of these instruments continue too show recurve all around their perimeters.
3-post-war Gibson cutaway carved archtops:
-at some point, roughly but not exactly coinciding with the change in the designation of cutaway instruments from P (for Premier) to C (for Cutaway), Gibson continued to do this but stopped the hand-carving of their plates at the cutaway area and instead started to use binding that simply followed the contours of the plate. This saved time and labour and resulted in more uniform final products, at the added cost of wider binding. They continued to use this approach for the most part until they ceased production of carved archtop guitars.Last edited by Hammertone; 04-08-2025 at 09:58 PM.
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Thanks, Hammertone, for the illustration and for clarifying these Gibson cutaways from a production perspective – it all makes sense! So, basically, IMHO, the rare Gibson Premier models of the late 1930s and early 1940s could be the most sought-after Gibsons.
It's said that Gibson was equipped with a large, modern machine park during wartime production, which was naturally readily used for guitar production after the war. Of course, when you have machines, every production step seems to be "machinable"; the value of handcrafting declines. What could make sense for the production of plank guitars, however, looks completely different for carved archtop guitars. Especially in the top tier of the latter, a certain amount of handwork is essential when finalizing the wooden plates.
The original models of the arched plates for rough routing in series may only have historical significance in the CNC age. However, in high-quality, small-batch production, which - why not? - may well include a bit of "going-further", custom archings and heights, or a particularly carefully crafted recurve, CNC would be too costly or time-consuming.
And yes, it absolutely makes sense to consider the top and bottom surfaces of the (pre-routed) plates separately, as both define the arching curves, plate thickness and gradation. Typically, as in archtop guitar and violin making, the desired outer contour is prefabricated by machine as close as possible, while the underside is left thicker throughout, which the maker then can rework depending on the particular wood pieces and the desired sound. The "D'Aquisto method", which focuses on processing the plate surface, is a historical variant that has been tested during 500 years of arched instrument making, but has hardly been considered to be fundamentally superior.
Gibson's postwar approach, that flat transition of the plate archings to the cutaway, resp. the elimination of the recurve are understandable from a purely business perspective. What is more difficult to understand is why this procedure was retained until the very end of archtop production, and why smaller and larger manufacturers have adopted that "machine-construction".
Here and now, we're involved with conjuring up a round double cutaway model from NOS big-body single cutaway Lang plates. It's feasible from the perspective of the top's outside, but you'll have to do some magic for the top's inside. Probably a little bit crazy, but doable.
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Sometimes I am asked why I don't like these flat surfaces on the upper bouts, especially towards the cutaway, on some archtop models.
My nonchalant answer: Because it is in the essence of archtops to be arched.
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Gibson built a plate-carving machine in the 1930s? for rough-carving 16"?, 17" and 18" plates. It was steam-powered. It was subsequently updated to run on electic power, and acquired the affectionate nickname "The Green Monster" over the decades. Over the decades into the millenium, one man, Richard Ickes, became its caretaker and operator. AFAIK, every carved archtop plate from Gibson, from the introduction of the machine until 20xx?, was cut on this machine, following which the plates were subjected to whatever additional scraping and sanding processes that Gibson used. I think Gibson eventually replaced this machine with newer CAD/CNC technology. Maybe someone knows more about the more recent plates. Presumably, with the newer technology, there would be no additional cost to making plates with significant recarve.
When Ren Ferguson designed the recent (2003-2012) L-7C, hundreds of measurements were taken from a fine example of a 1930s Gibson Advanced L-7, a CAD program was written and modified to account for a cutaway, and the plates were subcontracted to Boeing, who had the technology to do the work at the time. Those plates were delivered in almost finished condition to the Gibson facility in Bozeman MO. The carving on those is very different from the carving on Nashville-produced L-5 instruments.
Heritage devised a primitive plate-cutting machine that they used for decades, producing rough plates that required much more work to be usable. My guess is that this was replaced after 2016, when the company was sold. Maybe someone knows more about how Heritage plates are currently fabricated.
Last edited by Hammertone; 04-16-2025 at 04:53 AM.
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From what I’ve gathered it was D’Angelico that couldn't be bothered to change the templates when he started making cutaway variants. Gibson then started copying D’Angelico because his guitars were more sort after by a certain crowd. I think Johnny Smith might have been the deciding factor here as Gibson didn’t introduce this style of carving until the 50’s. Originally Posted by Ol' Fret
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Unless I’ve misread your post, Gibson did carve down into the cutaway into the 1950’s. If you look at the binding inside the cutaway on any l5 up to around I think 1952, the binding was the same thickness. It was to copy the D’angelico that Johnny Smith had (imo). Originally Posted by Ol' Fret
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Interesting - and comprehensible! Then it is probably not generally accurate to say that D'Angelico oriented himself more or less towards Gibson archtop guitars as the established volume manufacturer. Originally Posted by Archie
So that recurve-free and subsequent (more or less) flat-leveled plate area around the cutaway started out of convenience by sly dog D'Angelico and went, by intervention of Johnny Smith, to Gibson? Uh, not at all to diminish these men's achievements: all great men sometimes do or say foolish things - but it's up to those around them or their successors to correct even some minor deficiencies.
Some consider the use of the tall or hump binding on an archtop to be an elegant solution. YMMV, but it also does something to the cutaway plate area and the edges. Unarguably, the top is the essential acoustic source of sound.Last edited by Ol' Fret; 04-14-2025 at 07:54 AM.
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Thanks, yes, for now I understand myself a little better! I've always thought that, for some reason, the Gibson L-5C models up until the early 1950s sounded better acoustically than anything they made later. One of my teachers had one from 1951, and it was wonderful with a Dearmond. Originally Posted by Archie
Last edited by Ol' Fret; 04-14-2025 at 07:17 AM.
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Originally Posted by Hammertone
Yes, and let us not forget that Epiphone had a machine for rough-carving also.
Most of these "monster machine" inventions came from the early mass production of violin-related instruments.
In 1904 the engineer William Thau of Klingenthal near Markneukirchen applied for a patent a "machine for automatically milling violin backs and tops as well as similar plate-like objects", sort of a drum rotating router: DE168047C - - Google Patents .
In 1906 they founded a "Corporation for Violin Industry", called Giam in Markneukirchen, which was able to produce up to 52,000 violin bodies per year. The profitability limit was 24,000 units, but this was continually undercut from 1926 onwards. Attempts were made unsuccessfully to expand production to include mandolins, lutes, banjos, and guitars, but this could not prevent the company's liquidation in 1930: Cutting corner blocks: inside the Markneukirchen violin factory | Focus | The Strad .
I think Mr. Richard Ickes of Gibson would have been thrilled to see their engine room!
Small-scale workshops, like Artur Lang or D'Aquisto, and many others, had to take use of the mechanical dupli-carver or copying pantograph. Since the cost for CNC manufacturing are not low, many of the smaller custom makers will still rely on that old but reliable and flexible enough technique.
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