New Peter Stephen Commission

[Ears]

Peter's second build for me, the last was a completely unique design, this is obviously based on a classic one.
We're getting there.
Quartersawn Tanekaha body, quartersawn Holm oak top, maple neck, ebony board.
Will have oak pickguard and back plate.
I reckon the tanekaha is going to be a winner, straight as a die, growth rings like German spruce and super strong, would like to hear it on the top of a concert classical instrument, maybe next time...

[ash]

Cool. Looks like something out of a Sadowsky factory tour video with all those slots under the drop-top.

[Ears]

I will go and google sadowsky to see

[ash]

Here's a vid from Youtube with Sadowsky talking to Larry DiMarzio that shows a shot of a body without the top. They have a few more slots, but its basically the same deal. They do it on all theirs for weight and tonal advantages.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSJtt41VLKo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfjYC2mcPZc

[Ears]

thanks for the link! I designed the slots quite independantly for weight reasons, you can see the pencil drawings in upper background of the bottom photo. But I had a totally untested idea in my mind that I wanted clear and straight lines of energy propogation from the bridge claw area to the edges (sort of like fan braces on a classical top) while also straight uninterupted lines of solid timber following the tanekaha grain (why use such beautifully straight graned timber if it is all chopped up?). I have a suspician Peter thought I was nuts (he had some comments about how blocks of wood vibrate at certain moduli of something not along lines, I've filed it away somewhere) but as he is curious about most things he happily went along with it.

[Ears]

Thanks Rocklander for printing the decals, pic of Peter's build to come when I get hang of camera and resizing or compressing the pics.

[dayl]

Man, this really has my attention. Nice

Is this the one with the wider classical style fretboard?

[Ears]

Yes that's the one, not any wider at bridge, but is wider at nut, it looked wider in a previous photo I put somewhere than it is in reality. You can get a general idea of finished build, but not the details of wood etc, in 3 or 4 pics on this page http://www.nzguitars.com/forum/viewtopi ... &start=135. It arrived that morning so I had only had the guitar for 3 hours before the gearfest.

[GrantB]

It is surprisingly easy and nice to play! And she's a looker to boot....

[Ears]

pic

[sambrowne]

pic

Nice. It's like nature produced a Fender Stratocaster.

[Ironbird13]

that is gorgeous, plays real nice too, i even liked the wider string spacing

[Lawrence]

nice

quite inspirational!