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an authority on archtops recently said to me:
'the only way to make a spruce/maple archtop less bright is to make it with parallel bracing not x bracing.'
he spoke of the L5CES as the leading example of a parallel braced spruce/maple archtop. (which I'm sure is perfectly fair)
I was struck by this - but unable to asses it independently.
I wonder how often it has been (over the last 25 years) that the guitars I have got on well with have been parallel braced, and those I haven't have been x braced.
Heavier archtops with two pickups are typically parallel braced? is that right?
and lighter archtops with floating pickups are typically cross braced?
almost all the luthier made archtops will be x braced?
it is (typically) much harder to use an x braced archtop on stage than a parallel braced archtop?
x braced lighter archtops are (typically) much brighter than parallel braced heavy archtops (and feedback more readily)
for all my archtop obsession I haven't got my head round these bracing issues at all.Last edited by Groyniad; 08-29-2019 at 05:44 AM.
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08-28-2019 04:54 PM
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I always thought it was the opposite. This site gives some explanation as to why that is:
Bracing — Gilchrist Mandolins & Guitars
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Benedetto also writes that a parallel braced instrument will have more brightness and projection, and an X-braced one a rounder sound.
I am not sure what is inside an instrument like a Super 400 CES, but by having a couple of pickup-sized holes cut out of the centre of the soundboard it will necessitate a different way of barring to retain the strength of the soundboard than an instrument with a floating pickup.
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that's amazing - i think the bracing thing is fundamental to how our guitars sound and feel and there is NO clarity at all about the two basic kinds of bracing pattern!
as I say - I've always been a mixture of ignorant and confused about this - but getting clear about could save some money and heartache in the future
I heard - for example - that Nelso Palen's archtops are x braced - except a few he made for custom orders - which were meant to be darker and thicker sounding that he made with L5 style parallel bracing....
i think its very significant that even the experts seem to disagree about this - it makes the archtop world very difficult to get a proper handle on.
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If 99% of the experts say one thing, it doesn't mean there is no consensus and clarity on the subject just because there is the 1% that say different things.
Originally Posted by Groyniad
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Since I had easy access to it, this is what D'Aquisto said in the late 1970s. (first published by the Guild of American Luthiers, reprinted in "The Masters' Bench", published by the National Music Museum.
"Years ago, when I was making orchestral rhythm guitars, I used straight braces, because they give a very chopped, loud, short sound, which is what you want when you have to sit in a twenty-five piece orchestra and clonk rhythm all night with no amplifier. Straight braces give you a power shot that's strictly for rhythm playing; it's a narrow-minded kind of sound.
Today, straight braces are unnecessary. Cross braces have a more direct tone color, and they are much mor versitile. I've found that by opening or closing the legs of the cross braces like a pair of scissors, you can control the tone to an almost unbelievable degree. By closing the cross, you get closer to straight bracing, but you get even more out of the top, and you get a mellower tone.
There is nothing in an archtop guitar except those two braces - no brace under the bridge, no brace from bass to treble, none of that. Just a simple cross brace. For good tone balance, the braces should cross just about even with the tops of the f-holes."
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Try making one each way and see if you can hear the difference. Nice thing about guitars is that audible differences between guitars are audible.
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Unfortunately you have to make like 10 of each to reach any meaningful generalizations. Each piece of wood is different even if there are the same species or come from the very same tree. Originally Posted by icr
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I suspect the differences with all-acoustic guitars are much more pronounced than those with routed pickups, especially if they have two pickups. Those have several cross braces as well as the parallel braces.
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The top of my current early 60's Super-400CES (and likewise those that came before) is really thick in the center, where the pickup-cutouts are so I doubt that the electric tone of the guitar (and that is what it's designed to be, played through an amp at higher volumes) would be noticeably different if it were braced in an X-fashion. There are 2 braces running lengthwise across the top, at both sides of the pickup-cutouts, diverging towards the tailpiece end of the soundbox. IMHO the foremost task of these struts is to stabilize the top, preventing it to sink in under the pressure exerted by the bridge.
Referring to the acoustic archtop I have also read the aforementioned statements by D'Aquisto and several other experienced luthiers and repairmen and the consensus seems to be what was already posted above : an X-braced top helps the balance and sustain whereas the parallel braces boost acoustic volume and "bark". The other major deciding factors are of course the thickness graduation of the top, the stiffness of the spruce used (including the braces) and the amount of re-curve of the top plate. Lotsa wiggle in there .....
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lotsa wiggle room there indeed - enough to make this topic hard to settle definitively
and if there is a strong consensus that x bracing gives a darker mellower tone that's cool - i'm not trying to defend
my expert!
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There's so many things that affect tone. I think top thickness is a big contributor. I have limited direct experience with a lot of archtops, but I own 2 that are very similar. Same sizes, both with ebony appointments, solid carved spruce & maple box, maple necks, X-bracing and same pickup. One is floating and one is routed in.
These 2 have noticeably different sound, both plugged and unplugged. One is more 'airy' with a lot of overtones and 'natural reverb'. The other has a much stronger fundamental that overides a lot of the higher overtones. I think this is sometimes described as thicker or more woody sound.
Unsurprisingly, the 'thicker' sound comes from the one with the thicker top plate, which is quite easy to see at the f-hole at least. Surprisingly, while we typically associate this tone with routed pickups, in this case it's the floater with the thicker top that gives the stronger fundamentals. Kinda the opposite of conventional wisdom, where the floater is usually thought to have a brighter 'more acoustic' sound.
So in my limited experience, it seems top thickness has a huge impact on 'brightness and 'mellowness' since all things considered that seems to be the biggest difference between these 2 instruments. I can't really compare some other variables like details of bracing size, shape & placement, or top thickness away from f-hole.
Maybe there's more art than science in building archtops and controlling their sound.
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The L5CES is not designed to be played acoustically (although of course you can). That puts it in a different category from the acoustic archtops discussed by James D'Aquisto in the essay mentioned above. As a maker of archtop guitars, I strongly believe that a guitar should be designed and built with a primary purpose in mind - either acoustic or electric - because what's best for one is worse for the other. That's not to say you can't make a guitar that sounds good both amplified and unplugged, I'm just saying you can't maximize both potentials in one instrument. I see no reason to use X bracing in an instrument like the Super 400 or L5CES. There, I would want fairly heavy parallel (actually, V) braces to control feedback and produce a more focused sound with less bass resonance. For an acoustic instrument . . . well, what D'Aquisto said.
John
jscarchtops.com
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