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I had read that Orville Gibson did, in fact, pioneer the arched top for guitars, believing that the unstressed, unheated wood would respond better. Gibson produced an oval-holed arched-top guitar before Loar came on board, if I'm not mistaken. Lloyd Loar brought refinements to the design and especially the F-hole instead of the oval or round sound-hole.
I think I read this in Adrian Ingram's history of the L5, but my memory might be inaccurate. I"ll have to check my books.
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04-09-2016 12:59 PM
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One problem with the oval or round hole is the location of the opening. If a hole is cut somewhere under the string path this serves to greatly weaken the box. ( this goes for pickup cavities as well ) Round holes work best with the aid of bracing and thicker plate carving to compensate for a weakened structure.
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Ol Fret I appreciate your post--you said it better than I ever could.
The only thing I would quibble with just slightly is that there are stresses in every piece of wood pressed, carved, etc. Wood wants to move with changes in temperature and humidity, mainly perpendicular to the grain. In general the thicker the piece the more stable, but all guitar tops (whether carved or pressed) are relatively thin compared to the width.
The point of a box is that it constrains the movement. Therefore there is tension across the top in the "resting state" depending on temperature and humidity, also subject to bracing, string tension across the saddle, etc.
Pressing a top reorients the fibers and and may make it more prone to tension, but such a piece is pretty stable. Carving a top also introduces the potential for tension because you're taking a wood piece that is more or less stable at rest and removing some of the supporting structure.
But I agree the main tension across the top comes from the strings. That's where the archtop characteristics you described really shape the tone.
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So my 2 Cents LOL! Last September I visisted Daves Guitar LaCrosse Wisconsin (Huge Gibson CS Dealer) I played many different L-5CES thinline,regular,Wes M., Premier, Super 400 CES Thinline, Premier, as well as the Solid Formed Archtops mentioned here. I was very impressed w/ Gibson's archtops and thought the Solid Formed were quite good as well! But for the original asking $$$ price my feeling was why not just buy a used L-7C that would hold it's $$ value.
I also prefer the longer 25, and 25& 1/2 scale length on archtops as opposed to to 24&3/4" shorter scale. But that's just me!
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Yeah Dave might be the biggest Gibson dealer in the world. He has multiples of any Gibson you can think of. Probably 100-150 Les Pauls. Not to mention his 300+ guitar and amp collection upstairs--priceless!
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Ok, here some photos to demonstrate the differences between 'solid formed' and carved plates - as far as it is possible from a visual view. It is important for me to emphasize that I have no intention to bash any particular brand: a well-crafted archtop guitar remains a well-crafted archtop guitar, wherever or by whom it was made. On the other hand I do not uncritically buy grandiose promises of marketing departments, no matter whether they originate from a guitar manufacturer or from Volkswagen...
The hourglass shape of a fine carved archtop instrument (made of quartercut wood) results from the characteristic assembly of shorter and longer wood fibers that form the plates after the carving process. This 'grain run-out by design', along with all other factors mentioned in my last post above, provides the elasticity of the plates necessary for optimal acoustic performance. Of course, there are several ways to skin a cat, but until now, probably no contemporary luthier has beaten the empirical findings of generations of luthiers over 500 years. Well, some do believe they've topped, but actually they've only been optimizing their profit margin...
Let's start with the hourglass shape (red) formed by the length of the wood fibers and their run-out (blue) on a fine carved instrument. I added short comments on the guitars resp. plates on each photo. I don't know if forumites can call them up; if not, I'll add them later.
Two more pics of carved guitars:
The next one shows the soundboard of a well-known carved guitar that surprisingly close resembles the appearance of a formed or pressed plate - no matter if solid or laminated. That's why I would guess that the difference soundwise between such a carved top and the 'solid formed' top instrument launched by G. would be small.
For comparison the soundboard (laminated spruce) of a cheap Korean copy of the guitar above. Note that the dark sunburst spraying around the edge of both guitars, so beloved by players, sort of tries to hide - or imitate! - the characteristics of a fine carved archtop, the recurve, the hourglass, etc.:
Last edited by Ol' Fret; 04-10-2016 at 01:30 PM.
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This classic Epi Triumph from 1949 has a carved top:
Compared to the pressed top of a cheaper Kay - there's not much of a difference!
Btw., this one is a 17" Kay K151. It's exactly sized and looking like the Kay K1 and K11, but has a laminated spruce top, whereas the latter guitars sport pressed solid spruce tops. So, the sound is different...
Here a 1950s German Neubauer with a pressed solid top. A few of the old German manufacturers tried hard to get finer formed pressed tops:
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Apropos marketing pledges: like Epiphone, D'Angelico etc., in the early 1950s, the Gibson Company thought that the right technology for making electrified archtop guitars would be the use of plywood bodies. When Gibson introduced the electrified Super-400CES and L-5CES, both logically carved out of solid woods, for the sake of consistency with their past policy vis-à-vis plywood electrics, the spruce top was described as 'an unusual feature in an electric guitar' but 'a definite factor in the quality of tone and responsiveness'.
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Solid form guitars may have greater tonal consistency within a model, but I doubt that each example within a model would sound the same. The variance among carved instruments is huge. So it is hard to generalize.
Originally Posted by Grez
I asked Aaron Cowles once why this one archtop I had sounded warmer than an apparently identical guitar of the same age and all other specs. With no hesitancy he replied, "Different wood."
I responded that they were both made of the same woods. He corrected me and said that each billet has its own voice even when carved the same way.
I was skeptical way back then. Not so much now.
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What is that second one? That's the deepest recurve I've ever seen on a top.
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I totally agree. I have 2 L5 Wesmo's. On one the spruce grain is so tight you can barely see it and on the other the grain is much wider. They both have a very different sound plus the tight grained one has a little thicker carve. Originally Posted by Marty Grass
Also just because the wood is beautiful doesn't mean it will sound good.
Jimmy D didn't like flamed maple. He only used it because his customers insisted on it. He felt that plain non flamed maple produced a better sound. The best sounding guitar I ever had was a 78 Super 400. Not a spec of flame on it except for the neck.
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The recurve area of the plate is the thinnest area of a carved plate. If a builder wants a plate to flex more, the recurve area can be thinned only slightly yet alter the flexibility a great deal. The flexibility of both plates front and back has a big influence on the volume and tone that is produced by the finished guitar. Sometimes it isn't the type of wood as much as the stiffness or flexibility of the wood that counts the most.
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Guitar #1 - Seifert Originally Posted by jasonc
Guitar #2 - Lang
Guitar #3 - Lang
Recurve? Who can resist?
Last edited by Hammertone; 04-10-2016 at 05:55 PM.
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Hammertone has already nailed it: it's one of Lang's flagships, what we call a Super de Luxe model. Originally Posted by jasonc
You might log out, and then be able to read some of my short (not earth-shaking) comments to the pics...
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Yeah, Wenzel Rossmeisl must have loved steep curves!
The ROGER German carve is really something special, born from the bitter German postwar hardship. Though its design is rooted in the industrialization of the violin manufacturing from the early 18th century until the Great Depression.
Btw., in the early 1960s, when the ROGER archtop guitar sale figures declined, Wenzel made a few models by using pressed solid woods. Of course, these examples look and sound differently than the German carve guitars.
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I hear very good things about this 17" Venetian (except the price).
I found this diagram on how Gibson saves on the wood for the neck. Purists may argue against the design, but I know of a couple discriminating players that like the end result- how it plays and sounds.
If Gibson would come out with a thinline with mounted pups, I'd be tempted.
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The image was small. I'll try again.
"...features a very special neck that’s designed to use less wood yet be stronger while enhancing the guitar’s tone. The headstock is grafted to the neck shaft, which also runs in a continuous grain, insuring strength where a guitar is typically vulnerable and further enhancing the guitar’s overall sound performance. Where the neck meets the body, the heel block is precision glued to the neck shaft, and features a precision dovetail joint. The neck shaft is then glued into a matching dovetail joint in the body. Finally, to make the most of the Solid-Formed neck, a dual action truss rod insures complete flexibility in adjustment."
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Nobody spins cost cutting into "special features" quite like Gibson.
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It's pretty close to what Peerless does and it's been the number one complaint that critics have had with Peerless for as long as I can remember. One piece necks with a heel tend to leave a lot of wood in a pile of shavings on the floor so given the declining wood supply, it's probably a responsible thing to do. It may even produce a better neck since you can be more selective with a smaller piece of wood but all that being said, it does feel an awful lot like cutting corners for the sake of cost and then selling that as a premium feature.
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True, but from a structural standpoint lamination and scarfing allows for a lot of strength in tension-prone areas.
Solid isn't always better. There are a lot of weaknesses with solid wood that often don't show up until carving or cutting.
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Absolutely and I owned a Gibson many years ago that had exactly that sort of problem. They used the neck anyway and hid the weakness behind the finish. It became the single worst disaster I've ever had with a guitar (and the way Gibson chose to deal with it left me with a very bitter feeling towards Gibson that I still have to this day).
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Tell me it's good for the environment, tell me it's for strength, but please don't tell me it's for "tone."
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I can speak from personal experience. I have owned or played every Gibson archtop model and the Formed top is one of the best sounding Gibson's I have played. Huge voice and sustain. It has great clarity without sounding too acoustic. The mids are outstanding plus it is light as a feather. Gibson just overpriced them. Also IMO they should have bound the pickguard with single ply binding like the Tal. It would then be a real looker also. The build quality on the one I got is outstanding. I could care less how something is built. I am not a carved snob. It all has to do with the end result of tone and playability. These Formed tops sound better than the LeGrand's I have played IMO but I have only played 2 LeGrands. I always felt a Johnny Smith sounded better than a LeGrand. I call these Formed tops "the poor man's Johnny Smith".
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>> "...features a very special neck that’s designed to use less wood yet be stronger while enhancing the guitar’s tone. <<
Nothing "special" here. Like other (classical and flattop guitar) builders, Europe's former largest mass manufacturer of archtop guitars used this construction in the 1950/60s, even of a more refined type than pictured above (You'll never get famous with a Framus... ).
The "less wood" argument is most clear-cut.
"Stronger"? Um, well, this depends on some factors. In theory, it could be true. Just think of how the wood grain lines are running on a guitar neck with scarf joint vs. a common single piece one. The latter shows no problem if you use neck laminations or put a stiff veneer (tropical wood) on the headstock; fiber could be too soft, more of a visual issue. Or use a metal plate like the maker in my avatar did. Keep in mind that the headstock bears the tuners, and you don't want to have any unnecessary movement in this area.
In practice, it could be different though. I've seen some scarf joints of archtop guitars fail over the time...
"Enhancing the guitar' s tone"? There you have it, welcome in the world of hollow marketing promises! Are those responsible really thinking of the customers to be meatheads in perpetuity?
Apropos, neck constructions: in 1960 Willy Hopf was granted a patent of compreg guitar necks, made of multiple thin wood laminations and synthetic resin (Espacenet - Original document ). These are really strong - I call them 'propeller necks'. Some Hopf guitars used that technique and almost all Framus axes, until it faded away in the mid to late 60s, for good reason: these propeller necks steal some of the energy out of our acoustic boxes that don't have a high level of efficiency, anyhow. At least, in his patent application Hopf did some straight talking and had been decent enough to never claim that the guitar tone would be enhanced.Last edited by Ol' Fret; 04-21-2016 at 02:29 PM.
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Hi Guys,
Its a shame. Gibson kinda screwed themselves with this one.
The idea and the final results are great. The original asking price? Not low enough to warrant the purchase.
I guess if you subtract out the cost of the UNwasted wood, that's how they substantiate the price. I don't agree and I never would have bought one at the inflated original asking price..
What is not a shame.. It is an amazing guitar. The fit, finish, feel, SOUND and playability is absolutely incredible.
2 bad things happened with this guitar. The original price. And Greg Koch playing the crap out if it, but making it sound like poopies.
I cant do anything about the pricing mistake that Gibson made. But I am working on a little something that will allow you to see just how amazing this guitar sounds. Stay tuned.
Joe D.
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