Posted on June 6, 2024May 27, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: Crownless Frets Questions: Crownless Frets by James Westbrook and R.M. Mottola Originally published in American Lutherie #89, 2007 Gilles Danis from the Internet asks: I have been asked by a museum to restore an old guitar. It is a rather cheaply made thing from the early 20th century. The frets do not have crowns. They are just thin flat bars on their sides with barbs at the bottom. Do you know of a source for such fretwire? James Westbrook from England replies: I get my bar fret stock from Makoto Tsuruta in Japan. I think there are a few different sizes. His website is www.crane.gr.jp., and his e-mail address is mmm@st.rim.or.jp. The Questions Column editor adds: Nickel-alloy sheets of various thicknesses and alloy composition are available from McMaster Carr (www.mcmaster.com) but they need to be cut into strips for use as bar frets. Sheet metal places or machine shops that have shears can do this cheaply. ◆
Posted on June 6, 2024May 14, 2025 by Dale Phillips Google Calculator and the Guitar’s Magic Number Google Calculator and the Guitar’s Magic Number by William Leirer Originally published in American Lutherie #96, 2008 Since the frequency of the octave note at fret 12 is two times the frequency of the open string, the fret positions can be determined by finding a number that can be multiplied by itself 12 times to get 2. That’s the guitar’s magic number: the 12th root of 2. In one form or another, it is a part of every calculation related to scales, fret placement, intonation, compensation, and much more. When Google perceives an entry in its search field to be math, it switches from search mode to calculator mode and displays the answer. Any calculator can solve a math problem, and there are plenty of online fret calculators. But with Google Calculator we can view the entire equation at once and see the effect of substituting one part at a time, helping us to understand the “why” behind the numbers. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on August 1, 2022May 23, 2025 by Dale Phillips Conical Radius Fretboard Formula Conical Radius Fretboard Formula by Elaine Hartstein Originally published in American Lutherie #34, 1993 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 As a follow-up to Tim Earls’ article “In Search of the Perfect Cone” in American Lutherie #30, I’ve come up with a formula for finding the hypothetically-ideal radius for the fingerboard at any distance from the nut. Since a set of nonparallel strings cannot lie flat on a cylindrical fretboard, we wish to discover the geometry of the cone described by the strings. As Tim Olsen suggested, the outside strings (as opposed to the edges of the fingerboard) should define the cone. The cone defined by the fingerboard edge would give results with a smaller radius. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 1, 2022May 23, 2025 by Dale Phillips Questions: Fingerboard of Orpharion Questions: Fingerboard of Orpharion by Chris Goodwin Originally published in American Lutherie #93, 2008 Wayne S. from the Internet asks: Can someone tell me what the idea behind the layout of the fingerboard of the orpharion is? Chris Goodwin from the Internet responds: The explanation lies in the limitations of metallurgy in the Renaissance. The basic problem of lute family instruments is that you are looking for strings which are all the same length to make a musical sound with open tunings ranging over two octaves. If you have a reasonably fine bass string that makes a good musical note and provides reasonable intonation when fretted, then the top string has to be very thin and under very high tension to sound two octaves higher. They couldn’t make wires strong enough in those days. Orpharion, copy after Francis Palmer, made by Peter Forrester. Photo by Peter Forrester. The sloping frets partially resolve this problem by making the bass strings longer than the treble. The treble string could be shorter, and so didn’t have to be at such high tension to sound at a high note, and the bass strings didn’t have to be fat and chunky (and produce a dull unmusical thud, instead of a clear note) because they were longer. This is explained very well by Ian Harwood in an (English) Lute Society booklet on the Helmingham bandora. Purchase the booklet from the Lute Society: Lutesoc@aol.com.
Posted on April 7, 2022May 13, 2025 by Dale Phillips Violin Setups, Part One Violin Setups, Part One by Michael Darnton from his 1990 GAL Convention lecture Originally published in American Lutherie #35, 1993 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 See also, Violin Setups, Part Two by Michael Darnton Setups represent one of the most important aspects of violin work. They are the most changeable part of a violin and can make the difference between a customer liking or hating a violin. People who do setups for a living in large shops do a lot of them — countless numbers of bridges, pegs, posts, and nuts. If you’re making one or two or twenty instruments a year you’re not going to be doing many setups. For the people who do those things everyday, it’s a very specialized art and they have very rigorous standards. With that in mind I’m going to try to communicate to you some of those standards, along with some actual “how-to” hints. Tools A bench hook (Photo 1) is simply a piece of wood that has a strip nailed to the bottom on one end and a strip nailed to the top on the other end. It hooks over the front edge of the bench and gives a stop to work against. On the under side of my bench hook I’ve glued a piece of sandpaper (Photo 2). If a tiny, thin piece of wood needs to be planed thinner, I flip over the bench hook and use the sandpaper as a traction area. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
