Little guitars

[David Houchens]

I just finished my first small (single 0) guitar. I was blown away by the tone and volume of this little guitar. I will be building more of these. Its Adirondack/Brazilian.

[Dave Yelverton]

Dave ...I just want to add my thanks for the plans; they are excellent and well-detailed. There is a dearth of good drawings available both to buy and for free, so it was a remarkably generous act to effectively make a gift of your hard work to the public domain. It's a trend I'd love to see catch on!
Had a look at your website - loved the OO on display there. You're not planning to work through the entire Martin oeuvre by any chance?

Regards

Dave Y

[David Payne]

Dave,

No problem on the plans, I enjoyed sharing them. If I live long enough I would like to build each of the significant Martin designs. In the classical realm I stick to the slightly modified Hauser (undercut/relieved bracing). I would like to build a Torres, Ramirez etc. but time and money,,,,,

I have built several Fender style Strats, Telecasters and a Jazzmaster and Jaguar just because I had the impulse to do at least one of each of Leo's great designs. Now I am building two projects: a African Blackwood Hauser and a maple flame-top orange-burst Les Paul.

I have a musical split personality so I play all the guitars I have around.... I literally go from classical to the blues and back again.

Dave

[Ned Knepp]

Dave, There's not much chance of my following your plans so precisely that I'd even be able to blame you for any mistakes. I just don't have it in me to exactly follow instructions. I'm a pretty good cook but I never follow recipes. What the completeness of your plans do is get me close. I think I can make the adjustments from there fairly well. It gets me into the ball park. ( shouldn't say that, the Angles lost last night. My family is almost despondent. Baseball is over....)

I noticed the modern bits on your plans. The compensated bridge is one of the reasons that I'm interested in opinions about small guitars and bridge design. I like the pyramid bridges but I worry that compensation will leave too little material to support the bridge as well as the pins. I suppose I could make it a bit wider but much more and I just as well use a belly bridge instead. The catch, of course, is that I like the thin bridge on small guitars better.

Dave P., you mentioned making a 2/3 size 00. How does that compare to a size 5? I often find myself playing with a capo on the 5th fret to differentiate my sound from a 12 string in the same group. This has lead me to feel that a guitar tuned a third higher may be rather useful. I certainly can't afford to buy a "Clair" model Martin so I've been thinking about trying my hand at building one of these too.

BTW, it's seems that there are a lot of "daves" around here. We may have to start giving out numbers.

Ned

[David Payne]

Ned,

In the plans it mentions cheating the bridge just an eight inch or so wider for the very reason you mention.

The 00 I made for my grandson is 3/4 size (roughly) but I don't know how it compares to a size 5. the large bout is 10-1/4", small bout 7-1/2" and the body length is: just shy of 14". Scale length: 20.187.Body thickness: 3-1/2".

When I first strung it I was not too happy (I called it the pukelely) but I realized it needed heavier strings rather then light especially on the bottom end. They make a huge difference in sound but impart a lot of stress. I think they are medium John Pearse (Phos. Bronze).

Now, I like the sound even though the bass is not full. The reason I like it is it sounds good for it's size but more than that it sounds a lot like the earliest recordings from the great blues masters that typically had small guitars maybe Gibsons like an L-0.

Here are some pictures:

Dave

[Ned Knepp]

Nice looking guitar. Mahogany and spruce? I got a chuckle out of looking at it, Dave. Those strings look huge in comparison to the guitar. Do you tune it up a third? If you;re not, it may explain why you need heavier strings. It's just a guess, I can't say I really know anything about it.

I looked up the size 5 in one of my references books and it appears that your guitar is slightly smaller than they are. 16 inch body, upper bout is 8 1/4, lower bout is 11 1/4, Body depth is 3 1/8th inches, scale length is either 21.4 or 22 inches. ( From Mike Longworth's book; "Martin Guitars, A History" )

I used to have a Gibson LG 1 so I understand about the blue's sound. I traded it away in what turned out to be a very good trade but I still miss it. I always wanted a bit more bass out if it too. I haven't played one but I've always wondered if the deeper body of a Nick Lucas Special would help the bass.

Ned

[David Houchens]

Dave, Very nice guitar. Ned, Something else I was told once that made sense to me was a taller thin brace was as strong as a shorter wide one. It always seemed to me that a thinner gluing surface may make a small diference in flexability even if the brace itself was comparable in stiffness to a wider one. Might be wishful thinking, might be snakeoil.
The picture is before I'd finished the bracing. Also, excuse the mess. It must have been a cleanup day.

[Ned Knepp]

David,
That's a mess?? I'd have to scatter around a bit more stuff just to know I was working.

There's a lot of information in these pictures you guys are posting. It looks like you scalloped the top of your X brace too. I don't remember seeing this before. Now that it's finished, do you think it helped the sound of your instrument?

Now that you say what you did about tall narrow braces, it seems that I remember hearing something like that too. I admit that tall and narrow looks right to me but then, what do I know? Since we are talking about it, do you use tall, narrow tone bars on your mandos? (Not that I want to get off track but I'm curious . )

Ned

[David Payne]

Ned,

Thanks,

It is mahogany with a bear claw Sitka top. I have never tuned it up to a higher pitch since I wanted him to play in pitch when we play together. I actually never heard of that trick but I am wondering if the stress of tuning up would increase the loads as much as using big strings at normal pitch. I dunno...

About tall thin bracing: Gibson made a "Country Western" guitar in the 50's that was a dreadnought shape/size that had tall thin triangular cross section braces that just tapered thinner as they moved away from the center. No scallops just straight tapering geometry. The guitar sounds beautiful like a pre-war dread. The only hitch is (if you can imagine this) because of the cross sections all the brace intersections are compound angles making fitting a bit challenging.

Dave