Hi all, Does anybody have experience with putting some kind of weight into the box to balance a CBG? My second build turned out perfect, nice low action, perfect intonation, great sound and so much fun I haven't touched my "real" guitar in a while. But there is one problem: The neck is way heavier than the body and so I constantly have to push down the body with my ellbow while playing... I'm sure other people have experienced th same thing - how did you fix that problem? Any advice greatly apreciated! Thanks!
You need to be a member of Cigar Box Nation to add comments!
Replies
Re the Sustain issue.
Hi all, I thought that I would add what I know and do regarding sustain and then thought wow that’s a big subject, so I thought I’ll refer to my notes from building acoustic guitars over the years. I was right it is a bit of an in depth subject and as I’m not too good with explaining myself, I will contribute but keep it short and sweet.
With the full sized guitars that I build I go to a lot of effort/time to tune the top, back and braces to get the best of tone, volume, balance and sustain that I can.
What contributes to sustain is the characteristics of the top, back, strings and the strings anchor points and of course the player.
A dense or overbuilt top, will give a different sustain to a more flexible responsive top.
Take the example above of the large nuts being used to dampen [stiffen] the top and in doing so created more sustain, I suspect you may find that this was at the expense of the roundness/fullness of the notes/tone.
As one lightens a top it becomes more musical more responsive, but sustain will diminish proportionately.
*Stiff/heavy top = brightness of response = longer sustain, but the sound is constrained and lacking dynamic range.
*Flexible/lighter top = more responsive, more bass more acoustic sounding = less sustaining. It takes more energy to drive this kind of top; the energy comes from the vibrating strings.
Some soundboxes receive the strings energies and release them pretty much right away, while others will release the energy over a longer time. So how one builds the soundbox has a bearing on sustain also.
Does this apply to simple Cigar box Guitars? I think it can. A recent CBG I built was an experiment where I used acoustic guitar principals and techniques with a thin responsive top, active back and bracing considerations. I must say it has a “wow” factor sound compared to my other CBG’s......... Probably sounds more like a bad acoustic guitar, ha ha.
This was not a short post after all, and it’s only a fraction of the story
Cheers Taff
Keep going! Add more to this thread. Good shtuff, mate.
Cool idea Oily. But i have lots of wood. No sheet metal. Could even put a piece of wood across the tail end. Wont be exactly balanced. But would help and not interfere with the overall sound.
Going to be building an acoustic CBG. Was planning on putting a piece of ply on the back of the box to help with the weight.
Instead of wood, or maybe in addition to, why not a piece of sheet metal? You could still do thin ply...hmm. Just do a piece of sheet metal across the tail end of the box. Screwgie it on.
Great post - I was just wondering the same thing myself!
I have a question for you though, if you don't mind? The whole design is excellent! How did you get such perfect f-holes on your cbg?
Making the f-holes was actually pretty simple: I googled a template, printed it, cut the f-holes out, spray glued them to the top, sawed them out with a fretsaw, and sanded the edges.
There is a reason they are called "F" holes Jamie
Here we go...this discussion brings me back to wondering about sustain. Most of my gits don't have much of it, and I occasionally think on it, for just a moment. Short attention span. Rebar inside the neck, big nuts spanning the interior of the box, cylindrical steel attached alongside he neck, all seeming to bring some level of improvement in sustain. Hmmm. Hans mentions violin soundposts, and the recollection is triggered. I read about this stuff before! Didn't do anything with it. Short attention span. See Wikipedia/violin sound posts. See "The Effect of the Soundpost On Violin Sound" by J.E. McLennan, a University study readily available on the interwebs. Interesting stuff. Sound posts and Bass Bars are huge sound enhancers on a number of different stringed instruments, mostly the violin family, but also some arch top gits. I'm not looking to go out in the weeds with this stuff, but a dowel sound post between top and bottom of the box might be a huge sustain improvement. Anybody tried any of this stuff? Some builders use top bracing, though most probably don't. Did the bracing inprove sustain over your non-braced builds?The aforementioned rebar/steel rod/big nuts additions seem to have helped folks, but none of this stuff seems to be regular building steps used by builders in this forum. Have you had any positive, or negative results with improving sustain by adding internal structure, even as simple as a the dowel between top and bottom of box? Dudes, what worked?
Further investigation yields the following info. For what it's worth. Violin sound posts seem to work due to the strings are being "dragged" side-to-side by the bow. Jimmy Page notwithstanding, this is not the normal stress being placed on a git string set. Arch Top git players debate on what will, won't, or might be good in regard to round sound posts, square sound posts, hourglass-shaped sound posts, or trestle bracing, and they do get played the same as our gits. Strumming, picking, and parabolic string vibrations. Violins and arch top gits rely on curved instrument top and bottom surfaces, so bracing is required to a degree not usually found on cbg's (no real revelation there!). But!....all of these instruments rely on vibration to transmit sound, and hopefully, music. Makes building a cbg seem easy! Still, what about that sustain, boys and girls? Lord, I gotta go find something to do!
-
1
-
2
-
3
of 3 Next