Posted on August 1, 2022May 20, 2025 by Dale Phillips The Design Diamond The Design Diamond by Dan Neil McCrimmon Originally published as Guild of American Luthiers Data Sheet #100, 1978 The basic idea behind this geometry jazz is to have the elements of design organized in such a way to give a sense of cohesion to the total design. The drawing is of a classic guitar, other guitars will be different but should have simple relationships. I have not tried this with the violin but suspect it should fit in there somehow. The whole design is broken into simple subdivisions of the total length of the sides (i.e. 1/2, 1/3, 1/4). Line XY is half the length of AB. 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 April 7, 2022May 21, 2025 by Dale Phillips Visits to Guitarrerias Visits to Guitarrerias by David Macias Originally published in Guild of American Luthiers Quarterly Volume 7 #4, 1979 As a young boy, I used to think that for me to one day be able to play authentic Flamenco guitar would be the greatest thing in my life. Now, many years later, I do play authentic Flamenco, and I have discovered another wonderful way to express myself through the guitar... the Art of Lutherie. How I came to this discovery, is the story t hat follows. To set the scene, imagine yourself in Madrid, Spain, in the fall of 1966. After several years of Flamenco guitar study in San Francisco, California, here I was in Madrid. My guitar teacher, Adonis Puertas, a well-known concert guitarist, was leaving San Francisco. He suggested that I go to Spain for advanced study if at all possible. 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 12, 2021May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips Bending Sides with Silicone Blankets Bending Sides with Silicone Blankets by Michael Keller from his 1990 GAL Convention workshop Originally published in American Lutherie #25, 1991 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 Althrough I attended the 1977 Guild convention in Tacoma, I exhibited my instruments for the first time at the following year’s convention in Winfield, Kansas. I visited Stuart Mossman’s shop while I was there, and I saw the side-bending mold that he had. It must have cost a fortune. It was about the size of a Volkswagen van standing on end, and it had all sorts of hydraulic pumps and pistons. In a production shop that kind of tooling might make sense, but for a small shop like mine, making twenty to thirty instruments a year and bending wood for repairs, I don’t need that kind of investment. I bent sides for years over a hot pipe I bought at Lewis Music in Vancouver, B.C. I had to work at a regular job and save money for quite a while before I could afford to buy two Overholtzer side-bending molds. A friend of mine had a custom mold made by the Overholtzer company, and it cost $1,000, I believe. That’s a lot of money. I can bend guitar sides with either a hot pipe or a cast mold quickly and accurately, but I am in this to make a living, and if I can save time and money I will do it. That’s why I prefer my new method. By the way, would anybody like to buy two nice Overholtzer molds? 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 12, 2021May 20, 2025 by Dale Phillips Musical Strings Musical Strings by H.E. Huttig Originally published in American Lutherie #9, 1987 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume One, 2000 In the realm of stringed musical instruments, logically enough, the quality and strength of the sound produced is largely dependent upon the strings that the instrument maker must use. To be sure, a string tensioned between two fixed points with no sounding box will scarcely make an audible response when plucked. On the other hand, the sound made by a finished instrument varies widely with the qualities of the strings that are used. There is a Persian legend to the effect that the stringed instrument concept was discovered by a person wandering in a desert. He came upon the shell of a tortoise. The bottom was lost but the top part still had dry sinews stretched across the hollow shell. The wind blowing across them made a musical sound. The Chinese gave us the idea of strings made of silk. There is still controversy as to whether the hunting bow with its vibrating string gave man the idea of a musical application or whether it was the other way around, the stringed instrument providing the idea of the archer’s bow. 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 June 23, 2021May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips Finite Element Simulation of Guitar Top Vibration Finite Element Simulation of Guitar Top Vibration by Phil Banks Originally published in American Lutherie #18, 1989 The use of engineering finite element analysis software to determine modes and natural resonant frequencies of a guitar top can be a useful (albeit lengthy) process which, if used judiciously, can yield useful information to the guitar maker. As a graduate mechanical engineer and a guitar maker, I’ve always been interested in marrying the discipline of the luthier’s craft with that of science. I got that chance last year at the University of Sydney. While working as a programmer developing a Finite Element package, I was asked to produce a demonstration of the program’s capabilities. I decided to analyze a guitar top. 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.
