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King Billy Pine/Blackwood Tenor guitar

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 12:24 pm
by peter.coombe
This is my latest tenor guitar. King Billy Pine top, Blackwood back and sides, Queensland Maple neck, Indian Rosewood bindings, Black Heart Sassafras rosette, Macassar Ebony fingerboard. Scale length is 23", and is tuned GDAE. These very small guitars are a bit of crap shoot as far as what frequencies to aim for, the Gore/Gilet book is not much help so you just need to make a few and suck it and see. They are very different, the frequencies are higher and the relationship between added side mass and main top frequency is completely different. A much smaller amount of mass will shift the frequency down 1/2 semitone. After 10 tenor guitars I think I have finally nailed it, and did not need to add side mass. This is easily the best sounding tenor guitar I have made so far and now have a set of frequencies I can aim for in future builds. This one came out as -
Main air: 118hz
Main top: 228Hz
Main back: 300Hz
front.JPG
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Re: King Billy Pine/Blackwood Tenor guitar

Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 11:01 am
by Mark McLean
That looks like a beauty Peter. Elegant simplicity in the timber and the appointments. It all works really well visually, and you are obviously happy with the sound. I really like the rounded shape and the sloped shoulders. Is that your own body shape or did you model it off an old design?

Re: King Billy Pine/Blackwood Tenor guitar

Posted: Mon May 25, 2020 3:11 pm
by Jim
Beautiful! That King Billy looks amazing.

Re: King Billy Pine/Blackwood Tenor guitar

Posted: Mon May 25, 2020 3:30 pm
by peter.coombe
Is that your own body shape or did you model it off an old design?
The body shape comes from the Antes tenor guitar plan sold by LMI. Mine are loosely based on this plan and I have made modifications and tune it to GDAE rather than how a tenor guitar is usually tuned to CGDA. GDAE just sounds better IMHO. I have also made a larger bodied tenor guitar, but do prefer the sound of the smaller body. The larger body is probably more suited to a guitar player because it has a sound more like a guitar tuned in 5ths, not what I would call a true tenor guitar sound that has lass bass but projects like crazy. But then most of my customers also play mandolin, and GDAE is an octave below a mandolin. Most of the older vintage Martins used a small body, although Martin has made many tenors with a OO body. There is no standard for tenor guitars and you can make them all different sizes and tune them how ever you like. Most tenor guitars made nowadays have a bigger body. I don't like them. IMHO Martin got it right in the old days.

The King Billy Pine is from Gillian Alcock's stash and is the last piece I have. I bought it from Gillian just before she retired. Sadly she is no longer with us so I am calling this guitar the Gillian Alcock Special in memory of her. It is the second and last Gillian Alcock Special.