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Dear Jazz Guitar Forum
I see that Aria D'Aquisto advertises "pressed solid spruce." What does this mean? Do they soak and press a solid chunk of spruce? Do the graduate it first. Is it really plywood?
Confused.
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03-12-2013 04:02 PM
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It means that was steamed and bent into shape rather than carved. I generally take "solid" to mean a single piece not-laminated.
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To someone unfamiliar with archtop construction is there a significant tonal difference vis-a-vis carved and pressed? How about durability?
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A cost cutting way to produce a top without the cross grain dampening effects of laminated woods. Advantages are you get a lighter than plywood top that can have some decent acoustics, it's sometimes more resonant than a plywood top. Disadvantages are it's not carved, graduated, milled or tuned, the wood grain is compressed and doesn't follow the natural growth tendencies of the wood, so it's not as rich or "musical" a top as a good carved from a block top; not by a bit. Plus you're playing with the natural grain of a softwood top, it's subject to cracking as would a solid topped carved, though I'd imagine the wood's a bit thicker.
I think there may be some potential to make a more tunable top with the solid nature of a pressed top but no manufacturers seem to want to explore that route. It's cost cutting mass production.
DavidLast edited by TH; 03-12-2013 at 04:30 PM.
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Maybe you can think of it as being similar to how an acoustic guitar's sides are formed. Straight lengths of solid wood are sliced thin, then bent into shape on a form using heat. I imagine a pressed solid top to be analogous, just with a different shape, form, and pressure points.
A carved top starts out as a much thicker plank of wood, and has a lot of material chiseled away into the builder's desired shape. There is a lot more hand work involved, and arguably the builder can control many more variables via this technique, including thickness and the all-important recurve (the reverse arch around the perimeter where the top meets the rims).
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Thanks for the answers. I didn't understand the 'pressed solid' thing either.
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How about this?
FAQ: Laminated, Solid or Carved Top? J. Hale Music
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Jeff Hale's summary leaves out pressed solid plates.
These are not laminated in any way but are plates of solid wood of uniform thickness put into a heated steam press that squeezes, forms and bakes the wood into the shape of an arched guitar top or back plate. Once that is done, the plates really hold their shape - I have a bunch of loose plates that are still perfectly stable after 50 years of storage.
American makers like Harmony, Regal and Kay used this style of construction to make archtop guitars over the years. I believe that Gibson used it as well on some low-end archtops. Maybe they got the plates from a supplier instead of making them within their shops - I don't know.
European makers used solid pressed plates extensively for the tops of archtop guitars (most European back plates were laminated). Kollitz was and is a big supplier of wood instrument parts, so many of these plates may have come from Kollitz. Otmar Windisch (Otwin guitars) and Wenzel Rossmeisl (Roger Guitars) did use pressed solid top and back plates on some of their models.
Here's what an early 1960s Roger Junior with a solid pressed top plate (and either a solid or laminated pressed back) looks like. Research to date suggests that these particular Roger Junior models were specifically done for the British distributor (Boosey & Hawkes). Below that is a more typical fully carved Roger Junior, with the very obvious German carve.
Some makers of guitars have described their instruments as having tops of "Solid Spruce, pressed arch" or with similar words, but the tops have a second thin layer of wood on their undersides for whatever reasons. This is the "Laminate, type 1" to which Jeff Hale refers. IMO, it's bullshit to present these as solid pressed plates.Last edited by Hammertone; 03-13-2013 at 12:01 AM.
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Pressed tops can sound really nice, but it's an individual thing. Every guitar is different.
In the hands of a good luthier, a carved top can be superior, but every guitar is different there too. All things considered, I think pressed tops can be somewhat more consistent among production guitars. Your mileage may vary.
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I want one of those Roger guitars...
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I've been told my '88 L4CES is pressed ... I dunno ... I'm pretty sure the L4CES guitars have been carved since the early 90s if not always
I've played one of the Fender D'Aquistos that was supposely pressed
To me these guitars had a darker sound than a carved top ... more low end and less high end ... maybe that was just the guitars I was able to play
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So can someone provide something from a manufacturer that says a pressed solid top ISN'T actually a laminate? I can't. Solid pressed top = laminate.
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what cosmic said
solid pressed is Orwellian Newspeak for actually a fancy form of laminate with a thicker top layer and one (or more) layer(s) underneath to reinforce. They just dont want to say so
(not to get into this cussion over and over again; there is nothing wrong with this construction method nor with laminate guitars. It is just the words solid pressed that is incorrect)
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i'm under the impression that different factories/workshops/luthiers in different parts of the world have used both ways of making pressed tops - ie a single piece of wood versus 2 or maybe more pieces of wood - but one way or the other i'm certain there's no law they all have to follow. i think many people assume a tap-tuned hand-carved top is the holy grail, but it all depends on what you want doesn't it?
eg some of the older Hofners have laminates which must have taken longer to make than hand-carved guitars and the woods are just as beautiful, they did it to strengthen the guitar to cope with new playing conditions (as well as feedback control presumably) not necessarily to make cheaper guitars, but then Hofner was very eccentric, and fortuntely still is.
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Every luthier I've known, including the president of Benedetto who I talked with about this very topic about 6 months ago has not only known about, but seen, handled and worked with solid topped pressed spruce tops. But I can see your point mr. cosmic, and I respect your view. So can someone provide something from the manufacturer that says that we ARE in FACT descended from primates? Has anyone alive actually been alive long enough to have SEEN this happen? ... well? I'm waiting.
Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo
I don't hear anything. People=dogs.
I get so much from this forum. I really do. The next time I bring my wife to a family gathering I will be better prepared: "So can someone provide something from a client that says my wife IS a ho? I can't. My wife=18 year old virgin"
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Fresh frozen? Jumbo shrimp?
My 1966 Harmony, 1956 Kay and 1960's Silvertone (Kay) are all pressed solid tops, not laminates. I can tell this because the f holes are not finished.
Maybe modern manufactures use the term differently--examples? There doesn't seem to be any shame in using the term laminate, so I don't know why someone would say their top is solid pressed when it's a laminate.
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I believe the Japanese D'Angelico New Yorkers are (or at least were) solid spruce topped archtop instruments that employed press forms and not carving, to arch their tops. When they first came out, it was pretty common knowledge that this was the technique used, and it was published in their brochures and frankly claimed by their salesmen at the time. No shame in that, and their spin on it was that it distinguished them from laminate plywood instruments (the excel line.) They can and did rightly claim them to be solid spruce tops, but no, they were not hand carved, tap tuned instruments. Nor were they laminates or veneered composites.
David
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i think the most important difference is the lack of a recurve on a pressed top. Originally Posted by rpguitar
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Darwin didn't say we are descended from primates .He said we have a common ancestor ,which is very different Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
Alan
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Darwin didn't say we were descended from apes. I didn't say we were descended from apes. I claim we are from Mars, Venus or a dog. Read my post carefully. Originally Posted by alanh
Our common ancestor WAS a primate. Apes descended from proto ape primate, humans descended from proto human primate, an ape is a subset of the larger set primate, as is a human. But Darwin also theorized that it was a linear process, evolution and modern genetics would suggest that it's a lot more random, and a lot more controlled than he could have known. That's the evolution of thought. But let's not get on a tangent. I don't believe any of it. God put thin layers of veneer on layers of cross laminated wood and called it Solid Pressed Wood Damnit! And I'm with "what cosmic said" and let me add "what fws6 said" and nobody's gonna Darwin me out of anything using proof that someone or something could have put there to test me. So there.
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So how do I determine how my archtop was built? Im guessing cheaper archtops used the cheaper method (2 plus 2 is 4, I know im a genius) Crafter FEG 780 is the box I own. Im looking at mine now and I say its not all carved out of one block of wood, but I dont really know what to look for.
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Jim Solaway's answer seems to have summed it up pretty well.
My humble answer was merely based on experience not on theory.
If there really are people in this world who still do believe in Abrahamic superstion, I would be happy to provide them with counselling. ( I can't believe such people exist, but I am led to believe it's not uncommon in the former Navajo and Apache territorries).
As it happens I am a former dependency counsellor, Carl Rogers method. As part of any psycotherapeutic practice it is axiomatic that the counsellee transfers payment to the counsellor.
I would obligingly accept any reasonable archtop in lieu of cash.
PM me if interested, but not rudely.
I am so bored with my own sententiousness, but really I must quote one of the greatest poets of the 20th century "If you believe in things you don't understd then you suffer, superstitiion aint the way."
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Hmm...
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I disagree. If what you say is true, there would be no need in the guitar world to use the words 'solid' or 'laminate' at all, since you're saying they mean the same thing. The definitions of 'solid' and 'laminate' speak for themselves; no further clarification is needed. Unless you can prove that they really did use a laminate top, your statement "It's just the words solid pressed that is incorrect" - is actually incorrect (until proven true). Without actually having that guitar in-hand, you really can't say. Originally Posted by fws6
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Sometimes it really is hard to tell. Unless you look at the top at a place where a full cross section is showing (an unbound F hole, the routing where a set-in pickup goes...) often you can't tell the look of a solid carved top from a laminate, even more difficult on a solid pressed. Solid pressed tops tend to be uniform thickness, if you can set a dial gauge or have some means of judging thicknesses, a carved top is carved thinner in some places than in others. Originally Posted by stylesforfree
Another very subjective and not a set in stone method is solid topped guitars, pressed or carved, can be lighter. It's not always true, but many solid wood guitars, particularly better contemporary ones, can feel quite light when you pick them up. But that's not always the case. I had a Gibson Johnny Smith, and it had a massive block in the upper bout that extended well into the cutaway. That made for a heavy guitar, but still not as heavy as a laminate 175, for instance.
Truth is, sometimes it really is hard to tell. Most of the pressed solid tops I've seen I've known from information provided by the builders.
David
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