Ruphus -> Introducing luthier Ervin Somogyi (Jul. 22 2013 15:37:51)
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Ever heard of Ervin Somogyi? I hadn´t. Here is an interview with him: http://blog.dreamguitars.com/an-interview-with-ervin-somogyi-part-1/ Rationally explained detail on conditions related to guitar making, much of which one might have never heard of. With the man himself saying that it is not necessary to be aware of all such, only that it can help to know about it. And with one point he finally delivers the understandable support for what Tom Blackshear has been trying to communicate more or less successfully, whilst backing his message rather practically with remarkably voiced instruments. Somogyi sumrizes that one pretty clearly with: quote:
The Cube Rule (it’s my wording; engineers call it different things) is a fundamental principle of physics and engineering. It states that the load-bearing capacity of a material such as a beam or joist is a cubed function of its height or thickness. That is, a ceiling rafter one inch thick has a ‘stiffness’ of one (1 x 1 x 1); a floor joist that is two inches thick is eight times as stiff (2 x 2 x 2); a beam that is three inches thick is twenty-seven times as stiff as the first one (3 x 3 x 3); and so on. What this geometric progression means is that relatively small increments of thickness can translate to significant differences in stiffness. The percentages/gross numbers are the same for every unit of measurement: that is, the same formulas and numbers work for inches, feet, centimeters, etc. And they work the same on the small scale of guitar parts, too. What this means is that a thirty-second of an inch or two, or even less, maybe just a few thousandths of an inch too much or too little, one way or the other, can make a difference of stiffening or loosening a guitar top by as much as 100%. You can really hear that; it’s certainly worth knowing about. Especially when you can appreciate that you’ve unknowingly been making one guitar top up to two or three times as stiff as your last one, without knowing you’ve done so. From the standpoint of the strings, that’s hugely significant. Your guitars will of course sound very different from one to another, possibly without your having any clue as to how you’ve managed to do that. And it’s all from adding or taking away very small amounts of wood. An important corollary to the above is the connectedness of your structure. If your braces are a little longer or shorter (even if they’re the same size), or are a little further from or closer to their neighboring braces, or possibly angled a bit differently, it makes just as much difference. I found his interview amazingly informative, and as hypothetical luthier could be getting me his book, independently of eventually making perfecly fine instruments already. Even just in the way a Sebastian Vettel could be reading Enzo Ferrari´s biography. Ruphus
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