Interesting reading

[blackalex1952]

http://www.guitarmasterworks.com/about- ... s-101.html

[dshaker]

Yes, I agree. A slow start, but interesting.

[kiwigeo]

Um.....yes...er...all pretty straight forward really

[Dave M]

Yes it is.

I am sure that at some point the materials scientists are going to offer instrument makers some really useful stuff.
I can't really comment on this guy's CF reinforced polymer guitars - he doesn't talk about the overall design too much and I haven't had a chance to hear them.

However his traditionally built guitars with the three layer tops leaves me wondering a bit. He says leaving the top to side joint flexible is good but says nothing about the stiffness of the sides and about loss of vibrational energy via that joint into the sides and the body.

But I do suspect he is saying something useful about not having bracing. As G&G have said the very fact that there are so many bracing patterns that work suggests that no one is much better than another. Perhaps none at all could be a good way to go...?
The torsion box I suppose is the end point of the lightweight lattice bracing idea.

The addition of essentially a veneer covering the peghead isn't very exciting but that's just aesthetics.

I do however have a bit of a problem with his peghead images.

[wadkin]

All sounds very clever but seems rather circumstantial he provides very little evidence to back up his theory. Yes a soundboard is always going to act like a flat plate to a certain extent, and there's little you can do to radically change this; but doesn't mean you should scrap bracing. Bracing isn't just there to shape the sound, it's there to help the soundboard withstand the high load of the strings, but at the same time allow it to flex and vibrate. I also suspect that bracing also adds some character to a guitars sound because it does alter the mode shapes slightly. A character which would I suspect be lost with a homogeneous panel. I also wonder whether his soundboards won't have the same isotropic stiffness ratios as spruce, because allot of the stiffness presumably comes from the super thick nomex or am I wrong here?

Yes you want soundboards to be light and stiff, but you also want them to easily vibrate and twist in all directions, when driven by the slightest change in load. I'm no expert but that's probably the last thing you would want in a plane wing surely, the Tacoma bridge springs to mind here. Don't get me wrong I'm all for innovation but seems a little to simplistic to me, if you didn't need braces surely Gregg Smallman would have don it in the 80's.

I once read one easy way to judge a maker, is to look at the way he shapes the heal

425_Caucasian_Cypress_Flamenco__-_heel_cap.jpg (19.61 KiB) Viewed 12739 times

seems hardly elegant

[kiwigeo]

That heel looks like it was done after (or even during) a night on the piss. Whats with the cap??? Looks like a piece of shell has just been slapped on and no attempt to tidy things up.

[wadkin]

Here you can still see the sanding marks in the pearl I would not pay the money he's charging for shoddy work like that.

[Bruce McC]

re photo 3, " a spruce or cedar top thinned down to 1.5mm (1/3 of normal thickness)".
How many builders would normally make acoustics with soundboards 4.5mm thick?

[Steve.Toscano]

His work manship is horrible!
Example: http://www.guitarmasterworks.com/images ... _inlay.jpg

And those heel caps. OUCH!

[gpj1136]

I have played the Rainsong poly guitars. They sell them here in the states. I have compared them to the Martins, Gibsons, and Taylors hanging on the wall in some local guitar centers on different occasions. They are very loud. I preferred the sound of inexpensive Martin, Gibsons, and Taylors in that order over the Rainsong. I never bothered to compare them to the good ones. The good ones are kept farther away where they belong.

I think they would make a good beach guitar that can be heard over the sound of waves that would hold up well in that environment. I have to say I have no preference for a modern guitar sound though. I'm not really fond of Taylors either.

This website reads like snake oil. "Graphite is a natural enhancer of electrical energy"??????
http://www.rainsong.com/

[kiwigeo]

I
This website reads like snake oil. "Graphite is a natural enhancer of electrical energy"??????
http://www.rainsong.com/

Translation: graphite is conductive to electricity.

Of course the sound vibration generated by the guitar top is just like electricity....that's why guitars sound better when they're played by bright sparks.

[DarwinStrings]

I once read one easy way to judge a maker, is to look at the way he shapes the heal

425_Caucasian_Cypress_Flamenco__-_heel_cap.jpg

seems hardly elegant

Looks like the judges would have a bit of trouble judging my work then I also agree that is a rough looking bit of craftsmanship.