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May I receive your comments, please.2005-02-24_072809_Bracing_System.url

Jamie's been doing that for along time. A lot of folks think its voodoo, but his customers swear by it. Contact Jim Whelan over at the 13th fret and he could give you a complete run down of Jamie's bracing system. Jim has owned IIRC 6 of Jamie's guitars, both with and with out that bracing system. Jim says its worth the extra money. Personally - I say - what ever works! Who am I to doubt that Jamie has worked out a system that works for him.

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Lance@LuthiersForum.com

OK, that link does funny things to Firefox, but works eventually.

Here it is in regular link format..

Right, I've seen that before, and I'm sure Al Carruth will chip in if I'm wrong (and likely even if I'm not) but..is there a huge weight savings to be had there? Doubtful at best. Probably could've save just as much by tapering the braces into a parabolic section. The tone bars and the X-braces are both 'squared' with a bunch of holes in them. The holes also add little bits of engrain areas, which for me means more surface to play 'round with humidity shifts and splits with. But that might just my relative inexperience and paranoia speaking.

Also, bracing is a very, very small fraction of total top weight, and the bridge weighs more than the rest of it combined. The top alone weights quite a lot more. I guess the question is: to what degree does every gram count? And are the X-braces the place where we want to decrease weight? How 'bout hollowing out most of the bridge, or using much lighter materials than the rosewoods and ebonies we tend to use most.

All said and done, though, it does look mighty funky, and hey, if it works...Mattia Valente38407.332974537

I believe we've discussed this here before, or at least I've seen it discussed. I honestly don't see the point in introducing even more edges to the braces, I'd like to see an X-ray stress pattern round these holes when the top is under tension. The holes unless perfectly formed with ultra clean edges just seem to be failure points waiting to happen. A bit more scalloping or making them parabolic would save the same weight. But as a marketing tool, if it sells guitars, who are we to argue.

ColinColin S38407.3867476852

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

The grain structure of steel and wood and therefore the way energy is dispersed are very different. I would tend to agree with Collin that in wood there are a lot of paths of failures opened up here. That said time is the advocate here. If care is taken in drilling and facing the holes some of the issues with paths of failure can be handled.

Hi Bob, I met Jamie at Newport this summer and played a few of his guitars. They were among the best at the show. There were a couple of more traditional designs that I thought were maybe a little more responsive, but of the 50 builders there, Jamie's work was easily in the top 5 and these were some of the best of the best builders around. His esthetics are IMO as good as anyone's. Very unique and beautiful rosettes and binding schemes. Extremely fine workmanship and on top of all that he is one of nicest people you could ever meet. I don't know if the drilled bracing makes a huge difference, but they sure don't hurt. His guitars sound GREAT, play perfectly and look georgous. What more could you want.

Great disscusion guys!
They do look cool. Too bad they are on the inside.

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Wade
Nashua, NH
http://www.wadefx.com

[QUOTE=Dave M] Hi Bob, I met Jamie at Newport this summer and played a few of his guitars. They were among the best at the show. There were a couple of more traditional designs that I thought were maybe a little more responsive, but of the 50 builders there, Jamie's work was easily in the top 5 and these were some of the best of the best builders around. His esthetics are IMO as good as anyone's. Very unique and beautiful rosettes and binding schemes. Extremely fine workmanship and on top of all that he is one of nicest people you could ever meet. I don't know if the drilled bracing makes a huge difference, but they sure don't hurt. His guitars sound GREAT, play perfectly and look georgous. What more could you want.[/QUOTE]

I think the key words in this are "Extremely fine workmanship", From what I've seen of his stuff, and I have played one of his, build quality, attention to detail and material choice are top notch. That probably is the reason his guitars are so good, which they unbdoubtedly are.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Michael's point is well taken. Wood is not homogenous like steel. I think you could cut these holes in a steel girder and predict exactly how it would act. In wood, aren't you drilling through grain lines, and therefore introducing not only stress points as Colin states, but also weakening the material in unpredictable ways? I hope I'm wrong--but that system makes me nervous.

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From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

Too Cool!! I've thought of this notion myself, but had questions. This answered some, as well as raised others. Just another example of how inovation there in all of us that persue this craft!

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DES - Shepherd, MI

Most of my reservations have been voiced already. As a point of information: a top without bracing will be in the range of 90-160 grams or so, the bracing, all told, about 25-50, and bridges from 18-35. The lighter stuff would be Flamenco guitars, and the heavier 12-strings. I'd expect a steel string top to weigh 150 grams or so, add on 30-35 grams of bracing and bridge plate, and Martin rosewood bridges weigh 25 grams on the average, I'm told. There's quite a range, but the point is that there is not a lot to be gained from going to extremes in lightening up the braces that way. There are real structural risks, IMO.

I think the best 'take' on this is that Jamie is so good he'd probably make a great sounding guitar no matter what. If he likes to drill the holes, and it works for him, who am I to say no? But I'm not making any that way these days.

[QUOTE=Alan Carruth] If he likes to drill the holes, and it works for him, who am I to say no? But I'm not making any that way these days. [/QUOTE]

Nor am I. The potential for future warranty headaches...no, nightmares, is enough to make the experimental juices flow elsewhere.

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From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

Thanks to all. I'll take the traditional way to brace.

No guts, no glory!

C'mon, where is your sense of adventure!

I dare you to call Jamie on the telephone and ask him what he thinks about his bracing system. He builds traditional too.

Now you got me wanting to try it. Did you ever see the one Lance did?

For what it's worth, I tried this with some back braces on a prototype that I built. My only reason for doing it on the back braces is that I wanted to see what the weight difference was - I made the braces, weighed them, drilled the holes, and weighed them again. I forget the actual number but it was only a few grams. I can think of other ways to save that weight.

Now, perhaps the holes alter the stiffness of the braces in a way that is acoustically significant, I don't know. I do know that I don't want to pursue this purely for the weight reduction.

I think the idea has some merit. With wood, you don't really weaken the structure that much by drilling round holes in it. Now square holes wood be an issue. Big time. Perhaps Al, you should do a top conventionally, and an identical one using the holes as jamie does, and then take them to the interferometer and see how they compare.

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

I was going to say pretty much the same thing yesterday, but my viewpoint is based on machining metal. While the point about the differences between the two is well taken, each have grain to it's structure. So, it's probably a "time will tell" situation.

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DES - Shepherd, MI