Greg Smallman on the lattice-braced guitar
Philip Smith
gave a talk illustrated with slides and acetates on the
lattice-braced guitar, with the able assistance of John
Williams. After seeing John's Fleta in 1979, Greg was
spurred to improve on it. He achieved this by reducing
the soundboard thickness to 1.8 mm (typically 2.3 mm),
with diagonally-interlaced balsa wood struts (the
soundboard weighing 65 g compared to the typical 120 g)
combined with a rigid laminated back and sides (2.8 kg
compared with 1.5 kg). The back is made from five layers,
the sides from three that are thin enough to bend without
heating.
John Williams showed how this gives the range of
loudness he needs - fifteen levels of crescendo - and
the range of tone, from sweet to ponticello at all
dynamic levels. These guitars are LOUD!
Greg looks for strong fundamentals and first three
harmonics - the 'vowel sounds', and sustain rather than
rapid attack, with strong sympathetic resonances from
the bass strings. He improves his guitars by trial and
error, but one unusual approach is the extensive fine
tuning he carries out on the assembled guitar - which
he demonstrated by plunging his hand through the
sound-hole.
He taps the top to check the stiffness from
the pitch at the sides and the bottom of the
soundboard, and adds liquid epoxy-resin into the gap
between the robust frame he builds below (and not
touching) the soundboard, to increase the stiffness and
raise the pitch from G# to A or A# at the sides
(rocking from side to side) and from E to F or F# at
the bottom of the soundboard. These changes improve
the sound (but at the risk of going too far and
spoiling the sound - we didn't get to hear the
'mistakes'). For his first guitars, he could only
'hear' loudness, but as he developed his guitars,
he learned to listen for other things.
He explained that he didn't need laser holography to
test his instruments - then sprinkled sawdust on to
John's guitar, and showed the pattern of nodes and
antinodes when playing notes at different pitches, from
a single 'pumping' action with the bottom string, then
two circles left and right, then above and below the
the bridge, then six circles at a top C#.
Greg uses milled carbon fibre in epoxy resin for the
fingerboard which is cast in a mould with nylon strings
for the fret slots, and cured in situ on the bridge.
He builds in a curve in the soundboard to oppose the
bending induced by the strings, and another curve in
the back.
He also uses a hinged neck to allow the player to
adjust the action with a screw without touching the
bridge, as changing the height can affect the twisting
of the soundboard and change the sound. He demonstrated
by pushing up and down on the neck, which rocked!
Greg showed colour slides of the house and workshop in
the woods that he built himself - with wallabies and
kangaroos running around in the garden, with wooded
hills all around! (He has since moved to Melbourne.)
The session ended with questions from the floor for
both Greg and John. On guitar sounds, John said that
the baroque, 19th century and modern guitars produce
the sounds that suit their repertoire. The violin was
perfected 500 years ago, but the modern guitar is
relatively young, and still capable of
improvement. Greg commented on Fleta guitar
construction being distinctive, with extremely tapered
soundboards. On old guitars changing tone, he made the
point that the tension in the guitar is equivalent to
half a bag of cement, which the instrument sustains for
20 years!
This was a really interesting talk, and I hope you all
get the chance to hear this pioneering guitar maker.
Philip
David Schramm
Great info. I wish I could have been there.
During the CSU Summer Arts festival in Fresno, California I had the chance
to photograph some of the unique features of one of the guest artists 2001
Smallman. Also a friend of Jim Norris recently sent me some awesome photos
of the construction details of this instrument. Jim passed away a few years
ago. He was an American who built Smallman style guitars and was a close
friend of John Williams and a student of his father. These two experiences
have influenced me to do more research into Greg's methods and to prepare an
advanced "Online Apprentice" course for 2005-2006 on the Smallman inspired
design. I'm very interested in the adjustable neck feature. Did Greg have
any photos of the neck and body separate?
Regards,
--
David Schramm
Clovis, CA
http://schrammguitars.com
http://onlineapprentice.com
"Philip Smith" <p...@mordent.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
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David Schramm
My theory is that he uses stiff ceder in the central section and the
remaining two outer sections in the bass and treble halves become gradually
more flexible.
Philip Smith
> Thanks Philip,
> Great info. I wish I could have been there.
> During the CSU Summer Arts festival in Fresno, California I had the chance
> to photograph some of the unique features of one of the guest artists 2001
> Smallman. Also a friend of Jim Norris recently sent me some awesome photos
> of the construction details of this instrument. Jim passed away a few years
> ago. He was an American who built Smallman style guitars and was a close
> friend of John Williams and a student of his father. These two experiences
> have influenced me to do more research into Greg's methods and to prepare an
> advanced "Online Apprentice" course for 2005-2006 on the Smallman inspired
> design. I'm very interested in the adjustable neck feature. Did Greg have
> any photos of the neck and body separate?
>
> Regards,
>
One of Greg's slides showed the slot in the body for the neck with a
protruding ledge of carbon fibre (there's a lot in Greg's guitars!)
just below the level of the soundboard underneath the fingerboard
extension. This acts as a hinge. There is a platform for the screw
to work on below the fingerboard. The detached neck was shown upside
down with the screw visible. There is a key for the player to adjust
the screw but Greg didn't have one with him, so he just pushed the neck
of the guitar - fully strung up to tension - up and down a few times.
He emphasised the effect of humidity in changing the sound. Also,
it takes him three weeks to build a guitar, and another week to
adjust the built guitar - liquid epoxy resin around the edge of the
fingerboard positioned by standing the guitar at an angle. Balsa
varies in stiffness - 4 lbs to 24 lbs - so he is testing it now
(deflection). He uses a light bridge pinned with carbon fibre pins.
He also first strings the guitar - the sound is terrible - then
listens to it the next day - better - and leaves it strung for three
months for the wood to rsepond to the tension. The armrest is glued
on before final finishing, and doesn't touch the soundboard. Some of
Greg's guitars developed cracks near the edge of the soundboard,
which he cured by putting carbon fibre cloth on the soundboard, then
scraping it away to leave fingers of carbon fibre to reinforce the
top. One of the slides showed him bending the edge of the soundboard
to 30 to 45 degrees - it is really stiff.
Philip
richard c. spross
Thank you for the extensive post on Greg Smallman's
lecture. I found it very informative.
Regards,
Richard Spross
Kevin Hall
have never seen mention of the pioneering work done in the fifties by a
Canadian luthier whose name escapes me for the moment. This chap had been
an aircraft engineer or designer at one time, originally from Australia,
and he built guitars during his retirement in Canada.
The one with which I was familiar was owned and played by Charles Robichaud
and used once in concert by Segovia during a visit to Canada some time in
the late 60s.
The guitars had a wonderfully unique tone and great projection, although
the workmanship in it was slightly 'rough', as was to be expected from an
amateur luthier in those years. Of course there were no modern synthetics
involved, but the underside of the top was braced with a closely spaced
lattice of very small spruce struts.
Over the years I've lost touch with Mr. Robichaud, but imagine he still has
the instrument. It would be interesting to see if there is any link between
that early development work on the system and the modern incarnations of it.
KH
Timberline Guitars,
Canada.
Philip Smith <p...@mordent.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
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Matanya Ophee
>So far in the discussions on the various lattice-braced classical tops I
>have never seen mention of the pioneering work done in the fifties by a
>Canadian luthier whose name escapes me for the moment.
Edgar Muench?
Matanya Ophee
Editions Orphe'e, Inc.,
1240 Clubview Blvd. N.
Columbus, OH 43235-1226
614-846-9517
fax: 614-846-9794
http://www.orphee.com
http://www.livejournal.com/users/matanya/
Andrew Schulman
Kevin & Debbie Hall Sep 20 2001, 11:05 am show options
As far back as the early 60s a guy called Pat Lister was building
classicals
in Canada using his own lattice braced system. Pat was apparently an
ex-aircraft engineer from Australia, and built gtrs. as a hobby. His
lattice system consisted of a number of very small, light braces
criss-crossing a very light top. While some of Pats' workmanship was
not up
to modern pro standards, his guitars produced a lovely sound.
I haven't seen or heard of any of Pats' work for many years, and
virtually
never see him given credit for his imaginative development work in the
field. It is a shame that his work, which used no synthetic or
'wonder'
materials has gone largely unnoticed.
KH
Timberline Guitars,
Canada.
Kevin Hall
classicals. I see another poster has pulled up an old post of mine from
ages ago on the same topic, and the name is in there; Pat Lister. Just
for fun I'll see if I can dig up Charlie Robichaud and find out if he is
aware of any link between Pat ( who must be long gone by now) and the
current generation of lattice builders.
KH
Matanya Ophee <m.o...@orphee.com> wrote in message
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Kevin Hall
Amnesia by the case. Pat Lister is indeed the guy I was on about. Thanks.
KH
Andrew Schulman <abac...@panix.com> wrote in message
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Andrew Schulman
I am now playing lattice braced guitars, I have two recent ones from
Darren Hippner (he's not Canadian but lives about 5 miles from the
Canadian border!). So I am reading a lot about lattice bracing lately
and I just happened to have seen the post above a few days ago. That's
about the outer range of my memory ability, a few days...
Andrew