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262422 Ed Minch <ruby1638@a...> 2017‑06‑07 Re: One for the luthiers.
On Jun 6, 2017, at 4:22 PM, yorkshireman@y... wrote:

>  Made with bog oak - 5,000 years old. 
> 
> He also said something about their being carbon fibre in it, and it having a
floating neck.   I have no idea what all that would do, But I thought I may know
someone who does.


Richard:

Thanks - but I could not open the programme.   Carbon fiber is the latest thing
- there are several guitars with molded carbin fiber bodies (there are even 3-D
printed ukulele’s).  I have used carbon fiber rods glued into a neck to
stabilize it.  In the 70’s - 80’s there were molded fiberglass bodies that even
Greg Allman played at the time - turns out they are hard to repair!  I suspect
the carbin fiber guitars will be the same.

“Contemporary” guitars don’t have a huge market, with most buyer’s choosing
traditional designs.  There are a couple of guys making the floating neck. Thing
to remember is that no one has done a double blind test on any of this stuff,
and famously, a paper mache guitar was mistaken for wood 50 years ago.  They all
sound basically like a guitar.

However, the one trend that is here to stay in lutherie is the CNC machine.
Cutting an intricate inlay is fairly easy, but cutting the socket that fits
exactly is a skill that few have mastered - not any more!  And once you
programme in the software to make a neck - then you can make a zillion of them -
and they look just like handmade necks.

It’s a different world

Ed Minch

Recent Bios FAQ