# The Etherium Resonator - Microtonal design



## Winspear (Mar 27, 2013)

Hey guys! Came up with a pretty neat idea for something a little more than just a microtonal guitar recently. 
Details later - but here are the beginnings!













116 frets to lay - hoping to finish that in the next few hours!


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## theoctopus (Mar 28, 2013)

Tom, stop doing cool shit.

Also, cut your hair hippie.


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## Hollowway (Mar 28, 2013)

Wait, what's the resonator part? Are you putting a cone in that bad boy.


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## AwDeOh (Mar 28, 2013)




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## axxessdenied (Mar 28, 2013)

this should be pretty badass!


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## Hollowway (Mar 28, 2013)

You guys and your microtonal stuff makes my head hurt. I think I'm going to invent macrotonal music. I'll just have root, fourth and fifth. My puny brain could probably handle that. Although Schecterwhore would still ruin that for me as well.


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

It took me a lot to get my head around - spent months reading. It all became incredibly simple to understand the moment I actually did the math for this tuning and could understand what I was reading about 



Hollowway said:


> Wait, what's the resonator part? Are you putting a cone in that bad boy.



I did consider it 
But no - it's more to do with the overall aim and design of the instrument. All shall become clear!






Here's how far I got for tonight!


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## Hollowway (Mar 28, 2013)

That FB looks like a SAT scantron or something. 

EDIT: How are you slotting that FB for those partial frets?


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

I'm not - I took the easy route , flattened the bottoms and superglued them on 
It's been done plenty of times though - not sure how!


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## Kroaton (Mar 28, 2013)

Somebody is going to have fun learning some makams.


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## Necromagnon (Mar 28, 2013)

Kroaton said:


> Somebody is going to have fun learning some makams.


I was thinking about fretjob (planification, crowning, etc.) 
Good luck man, see you next year!

And I'm totally with hollow: I just can't use myself with a normal scale, so this microtonal stuff just pass me so high.


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## vansinn (Mar 28, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


> I'm not - I took the easy route , flattened the bottoms and superglued them on
> It's been done plenty of times though - not sure how!



Very interesting concept.. 
What about expansion/extraction in the wood, couldn't this potentially create enough tension to have the frets come lose?
I'm aware of round fret wire having been glued into round grooves, which I think ought to result in more gluing/contact surface..

How did you arrive at this particular fretting layout?
Intended for which music and scales?


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## Metal_Webb (Mar 28, 2013)

vansinn said:


> Very interesting concept..
> What about expansion/extraction in the wood, couldn't this potentially create enough tension to have the frets come lose?



If he'd glued a single length of wire with the grain along the FB I'd be worried about that. As is, there's probably not going to be much issue that'd warrant the bond breaking. I.e. the bond length parallel to the movement is a small % of the total length of timber that the movement can happen over. Though, if they did come off it'd be a simple enough process to reattach them I guess


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

Metal_Webb said:


> If he'd glued a single length of wire with the grain along the FB I'd be worried about that. As is, there's probably not going to be much issue that'd warrant the bond breaking. I.e. the bond length parallel to the movement is a small % of the total length of timber that the movement can happen over. Though, if they did come off it'd be a simple enough process to reattach them I guess



Yeah pretty much  I should make clear that this is only a prototype - it will be ugly and with a fretjob nowhere near perfect 

Ok - details:
As an audio engineer and synth user, I have an understanding and interest in overtone harmonics/partials. It interested me to know that the 3rd, 5th etc of the root we play in regular 12 tone, is not perfectly in tune like the harmonic partial. The tuning for this guitar is basically the result of me trying to wrap my head around the maths and figure out what was going on. 
What I have done is taken the harmonic overtone series which goes like so:





In the red highlighted area is the harmonic series. 
Playing any note, the first harmonic is the octave. Then the 5th in the next octave, the next octave, major 3rd, 5th, minor 7th, next octave..and so on. If you understand the chart you can see that for every octave of partials there are more notes added in between. I've gone up to the 64th harmonic here (which results in 32 different notes - the other 32 are octave doubles which you can see in the 'partials' column. In the final column containing all note names, I have also in brackets stated which notes are closest to regular 12 tone scale and by how many cents they are out (or rather, in) 

I've then shifted them all down the required amount of octaves to fit them all into one octave, resulting in a 32 note per octave chromatic scale. 
The reason I went so deep, is that I was mapping it out on a synth and finding so many cool chords the more I added. When you get into the 5th octave of partials, you actually also start to find that you have available to you some perfect harmonics of notes other than your root, which is pretty cool (beginning to stretch the problem of just intonation only working perfectly in one key). 

My root was 130.81hz - This is a mistake, I am going an octave below that to guitar drop C. 
Yes this instrument will not be tuned as a bass, but as a guitar in open C - CGCGC. 
Tuned like that because it makes the fretting system pretty logical (you can see it's not too chaotic - lots of patterns - I'll upload the finished product today). Most intervals are quite playable on this scale length, especially given it'll mostly be used for melodies with drone strings. 

The choice of instrument to build this prototype on was largely due to the 34" scale length accommodating the very small frets. It will only be fretted to the octave, because even there things get slightly smaller than the 24th fret on a Les Paul (you can see in the cents column that the intervals get progressively smaller up the scale)
Another benefit of this scale length is that with the nice thin guitar strings and high tension I will use, harmonic overtones will be naturally a lot stronger. 
The spacing is also perfect, as I will be reworking the headstock to accommodate octave strings. This instrument will be a 10 string tuned as such:
C2c3 G2g3 C3c4 g3g3 c4c4

Now the really fun part - I will be building a low profile detachable rack which mounts across the sound hole under the strings and extends to the edges of the body for sympathetic strings with a 10" scale length. There will be 32 of them, one for every partial. This design will allow the tension of the strings to not be placed across the body, as it would most likely break 

So there we have it - 'The Etherium Resonator' - a 32 note per octave just intonation super longscale double-course guitar, with sympathetic strings and an entire design based around what will hopefully be an incredibly loud, resonant, and perfectly harmonic experience - with every note existing somewhere within every other note.


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

I should mention that this bass is actually pretty nice. I picked it up as it was perfect for the job (being already fretless) and only £140 - it's a Harley Benton from Thomann. I can't actually notice any issues with it! It looks cheap, binding is stickers etc..But it works great and sounds nice. Really nice preamp too, also a nice output jack where the battery is and an XLR which is a cool addition. The fretboard is also some of the darkest rosewood I've seen. Might be dyed.


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## Hollowway (Mar 28, 2013)

That has to be the coolest thing I've ever heard of. And I'm glad you didn't start a thread talking about how you're going to do it, and then never so it (like so many others). Hopefully this will get people to stop saying 8 strings are too crazy to be practical - those look positively conservative next to your HAL9000 build.


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

Hollowway said:


> And I'm glad you didn't start a thread talking about how you're going to do it, and then never so it (like so many others).



I sure wasn't going to put all that maths to waste 






Ooooh yeah. This is so much fun to play! 

The nut is stuffed with paper at the moment (fretless nut means it's slotted way too deep) so the action is a mile high, and the bass strings being incredibly tight...But it's still a lot easier to play than I thought it would be. 

Buzzing in about 30% of positions - Time to do the fretwork.....


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## CaptainLuckeyBeard (Mar 28, 2013)

I'm gonna need a few dozen videos to wrap my head around this insanity. This is magnificent and you sir, are a bad ass!


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## ixlramp (Mar 28, 2013)

Unspeakably awesome ...


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## BlackMastodon (Mar 28, 2013)

Definitely want to see some videos of your mad science EE. Definitely reminds me of a scantron or some kind of crazy mozaic.


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## Necromagnon (Mar 28, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


>


B5

Submarine down


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## StevenC (Mar 28, 2013)

All I can say is I want a go.


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## Nag (Mar 28, 2013)

needs more frets


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## Curt (Mar 28, 2013)

Nevermind the actual use of the instrument... That just looks insane.


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## Winspear (Mar 28, 2013)

I'm so glad I did this , it's awesome haha. I just finished the fret work. I say finished - it's just enough to feel comfortable and not buzz - by no means very nice looking haha. 
Well, that's all I can do for now as I'm away for a week and need to get new strings, a nut, and a drill to continue!


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## Devyn Eclipse Nav (Mar 28, 2013)

I have two things to say:

1: I think you are actually fucking insane

2: Where do I sign up to order one!?!?!? Or something similar, anyway. I would love to at least give this a shot, once in my life. It is just bad-ass.


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## vansinn (Mar 29, 2013)

I will so be looking forward to your "low profile detachable rack which mounts across the sound hole under the strings and extends to the edges of the body for sympathetic strings" invention 
And the viral-going vids..

BTW, are you sure 10" wil be enough for the drones?
Why not diagonally to the body, at, say.. roughly a 30 deg angle?


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## Winspear (Mar 29, 2013)

Zeno said:


> I have two things to say:
> 
> 1: I think you are actually fucking insane
> 
> 2: Where do I sign up to order one!?!?!? Or something similar, anyway. I would love to at least give this a shot, once in my life. It is just bad-ass.



1. 
2. Seriously, give it a shot! Including the fret tang nippers, file etc, this probably will cost me no more than £220 total.



vansinn said:


> BTW, are you sure 10" wil be enough for the drones?
> Why not diagonally to the body, at, say.. roughly a 30 deg angle?



Good idea. They are definitely something I need to research - also with regards to what kind of tension + octave would be best. I should be able to manage a 12"-15" fan looking at it


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## InfinityCollision (Mar 29, 2013)

Very interesting, you don't often see westerners working with tones that far out in the harmonic series.


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## welsh_7stinger (Mar 29, 2013)

This looks awesome. I'm glad to see I'm not the only brit that has interest in things beyond the 12 tone octave. I'd love to see a vid of this beauty in action.


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## callankirk (Mar 29, 2013)

This is probably the gnarliest thing I've seen on this forum in MONTHS. Absolutely insane. Mad kudos man. Mad kudos.


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## Kroaton (Mar 30, 2013)

Can't fucking wait to hear this thing in action and see what you do with it.
Apart from Turkish Oud music, I've never heard any microtonal string instrument that I've liked really liked in a solo capacity.
Though there are quite a few 24 edo string quartet pieces that sound utterly amazing.

Example.


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## ixlramp (Mar 30, 2013)

The closest concept to this i know of is Matthew Grasso's Raga guitar, which is fretted for 12 tone Just Intonation.








Details are here Matthew Grasso | Guitars


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## Winspear (Apr 5, 2013)

Thanks for those clips! Cool stuff
Just bought a ton of hardware to throw together this sympathetic string part. Also fitted the extra 5 tuners..Best peg layout I've ever seen


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## ixlramp (Apr 5, 2013)

Here's 2 more featuring his 14 tone version.





Your instrument will sound much better though EE due to the double courses and scale length.


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## djentinc (Apr 5, 2013)

Tom... you are nuts .

I really want to see some videos of this when it's done, it's gonna sound RIDONKULOUS.


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## ixlramp (Apr 5, 2013)

Hollowway said:


> You guys and your microtonal stuff makes my head hurt. I think I'm going to invent macrotonal music. I'll just have root, fourth and fifth. My puny brain could probably handle that. Although Schecterwhore would still ruin that for me as well.


Strangely enough macrotonal counts as microtonal, here's a blurry 9 frets per octave Xiphos:






Some 7EDO music where every fret is used in the heptatonic scale, super easy no patterns to learn haha:



This excellent album is free at a very cool netlabel for free beats/electronica microtonal stuff NANA WODORI - knowsur - album at split-notes microtonal netlabel


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## Winspear (Apr 6, 2013)

Been hard at work today...

The tuning peg layout is quite hilarious. I presume some string guides will be much needed 

I need a new nut..

Apart from that, just the drone string frame to finish off. Attachments are done and it's finished for the most part. I want to add more support because it definitely can't take 32 x 15lbs currently. I don't think I'll fit that many strings on it anyway. 

I just need to add the 'tuning keys' - but I need to acquire a tap and die for that. So that's all until then - I'll carry on drilling string holes and filing nut+bridge slots on the frame for now


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## Winspear (Apr 6, 2013)

I am also going to be tuning this a bit lower to A, rather than C. This is to solve tension issues with the drone strings.
Guitar tuning: AEAEA (A1 - A3)
Drones tuning: A3 - A4

Hopefully the strings have arrived at my flat when I return tomorrow and I can start to get some sounds out of this!


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## Winspear (Apr 6, 2013)

I updated this chart, if anyone is interested. There were small mistakes in the last one. This one has the Hz from A, and also the total cent interval useful for tuning. Bolded and italic in that column (as well as detailed on the far right) are the closest notes to 12EDO.

Most interestingly, I have gone through and noted some new info in the relations column.
I mentioned about how when going deep into the harmonic series you start to find some of your notes are part of the perfect harmonic series of other notes. Those relations are detailed in this column.
For example:
The 28th note, ratio 15/8, a perfect major seventh - also happens to be the 3/2 (perfect fifth) of the 5/4 (major third). 
Some other relations to the 5/4 available in this tuning are the 9/8, 11/8, 7/4, 5/4, and the 3/2. 
This means from my major third, I can form a perfectly harmonic major 2nd, major 3rd, flat 5th, 5th, and minor 7th.
Voice leading from 1-3-5-7 on the root to 1-3-5-7 on the 3rd is pretty much the best sound ever in this tuning..

Building from the perfect fifth, there are even more (10!) perfect harmonics available.

Maths is fucking awesome 

It's worth noting that because the intervals on this guitar are so small, you can in fact get pretty close to perfect harmonics starting on any note. I've listed only the exact ones, but to be honest most of them are probably off by inaudible amounts! This should mean this instrument can play in any key...


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## Daf57 (Apr 6, 2013)

Fascinating! In for the ride!


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## ixlramp (Apr 6, 2013)

I really like the pattern of the frets, it has a clear structure that visually helps you to locate yourself and memorise patterns ... this is what a root-fifth-octave tuning does for just-intonation.

This thing about JI only working in one key is a misunderstanding, it works fine in all modes, it's just that the available intervals in each mode are often different haha, so you may not be able to modulate a scale to a different tonic unchanged, you could see that as a disadvantage and/or an advantage, with your 32 tone system on the tonic A you have 32 modes of that harmonic scale, in each mode most of the 31 available intervals will be subtly different.

I feel you may find that using a tonic of A is very consonant but the most interesting and beautiful scales will be found in the modes, because they will have more 'edge' and dissonance available.

Someone i know of who builds acoustic sympathetic string instruments recommends very low tension / small gauge plain steels for the sympathetics. You certainly don't need 32, just enough for modulating between a few scales during a performance.


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## Winspear (Apr 7, 2013)

Thanks for the info and advice 
The original idea to have a sympathetic for every note isn't going to happen. I'm not sure how many I'm going to fit on there later today - but I'm going to try and figure out what tuning would be best for them, perhaps using the notes I've detailed as 'related' on the previous chart.
I'm thinking of maybe putting them in sets of 3 or 4 that are spaced apart a little bit and can be strummed, each tuned to a chord.
What kind of tension is very low? I was going to go with around 15lbs which would be using gauges around 13-17


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## vansinn (Apr 7, 2013)

ixlramp said:


>




Now, if only this music had been available early 80's..
would've been great for the Tempest game


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## vansinn (Apr 7, 2013)

For ideas to the resonating strings, maybe check out Electric Sitar, Gregg Fosse, Asheville NC Music
It's of course a very different instrument.. (not meaning to go off topic)


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## muffinbutton (Apr 7, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


>



TL;DR the red lines look like a ruler.


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## ixlramp (Apr 7, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


> The original idea to have a sympathetic for every note isn't going to happen. I'm not sure how many I'm going to fit on there later today - but I'm going to try and figure out what tuning would be best for them, perhaps using the notes I've detailed as 'related' on the previous chart.
> [...]
> What kind of tension is very low? I was going to go with around 15lbs which would be using gauges around 13-17


Well the tuning of the symps will vary according to the scale you are using, so just initially tune them equally spaced in pitch from A3 to A4, then you will only need to retune each symp by roughly +-1 semitone to resonate with the scale tones.

If you're gonna strum them then as low tension as possible while still having good tone, i would start with 10 pounds: same as a guitar .008 top E string. .017s are slightly stiff you might prefer to use plains from .008 to .015 or so. Sitars etc. use the same .010 wire for all symps and vary the symp length instead to get differing pitches.


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## ixlramp (Apr 7, 2013)

muffinbutton said:


> TL;DR the red lines look like a ruler.


That's the fractal structure of the harmonics you see


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## Winspear (Apr 7, 2013)

So here is the drone attachment fixed on. Completed are 4 string runs - but I only have one string to test them with at the moment. 
I think I'll fit about 12-15 drones on this instrument in the end. 

A problem that became clear before stringing up is that the attachment is not strong enough. The top of the guitar is contoured and with the string pull, the metal comes up at the sides which also brings the length of the string too high towards the playable strings. 

I have been tuning this .017 string to around 10lbs at which point it works well - then pushing down the sides of the attachment it gains another 5lbs tension bringing it to E4. I plan to run all the drone strings around 13lbs tension I think. I'll find the appropriate gauges for that later as the tuning range and scale length are set in stone.

I have toyed with the idea of trying to drill into the top for some attachments closer to the edges, rather than just the 4 clamped at the soundhole. I'm not sure if this is a good idea!

First, I will try tying the wings of the attachment tight across the back of the guitar. I think that will work pretty well to keep the string down and also couple the metal to the body.

Now some pics of this incredibly ghetto prototype. 
Warning: This work is incredibly shoddy, with little to no real measurement devices used, no work bench, little planning - just a hand saw,a powerdrill and a crazy mans improvisation 






















The attachment is clamped to the soundhole by 4 screws and 2 bars underneath the soundhole. 
L shaped ends are used to mount the tuners, with a slight extension added for 'nut slots' and string height over the screws.
Small bars of wood are added behind the bottom of the L shaped end pieces. These allow me to screw in the tuning keys (screw eyes - Original Strandberg hardware, quality stuff ) and tighten them. The wood seems to hold the tuning fine - if I have problems with slippage I'll mount them into metal which I will need to thread manually.
The wood is held to the metal by the gold screw eyes. The larger silver screw eyes are the tuners. 
In one of the pics you can see how the strings are threaded through - a hole is drilled at an angle through the bottom of the wood and out the side of the metal - the ballend is held underneath the wood and is visible in a photo. 
To save space, the strings are mounted in an alternating pattern - Each side of the guitar alternating ballend with tuning key.
However, with my lack of planning and changing the design - you can see I screwed that up for this first part and it actually goes Tuner, Ball, Ball, Tuner on one side and Ball Tuner Tuner Ball on the other...There are also extra holes in the wrong places and nut slots for 6 strings rather than 4 before I figured out what I was doing and increased the spacing 

Tuning is accomplished by pulling the string through the key fairly tight, and then turning it with a pair of pliers. It gets tough but holds well!

Plucking this string the tone is solid and quite metallic of course - I think that will be a nice feature for the drone strings. 

Not having the strings for this arrive yet, I slipped this contraption under my 6 string acoustic and held it there while playing some. Strange thing is, the drone string activated the strings on the guitar (tuned in unison), but the strings on the guitar did not activate the drone string. Not very useful - hopefully it does not turn out like this 


All for now...  

P.S. When I said I was going to have to tune it to A instead of C..I derped on the math. I probably can tune it as high as I intended - we'll see what I decide.


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## Winspear (Apr 7, 2013)

Alright - It's staying in C!

Tuned C2C3 G2G3 C3C4 G3G3 C4C4 with strings 55/25 - 35/15 - 25/11 - 15/15 - 11/11

This gives super heavy tension in terms of guitar - 29lbs to 22lbs progressive.

There will be 13 sympathetic strings to tune to the chromatic scale of whatever I'm playing. 
I sorted out the gauges and tensions based on the approximation of 12EDO I bolded on the chart.
So it's 14.5" to 15.5" drones, C4 to C5, gauges .018 to .010. All of these will have between 13lbs and 14.5lbs of tension.

Ordering the drone strings now


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## Winspear (Apr 9, 2013)

One ugly motherfucker!

Tying string across the back to counteract the tension worked really well. The frame is very stable. Tuning stability of the pegs is very good, provided you begin tuning with the string very slack so that the peg can get nice and buried in the wood. 

I did break one peg but there's room for several more  

Just waiting for the nut and main strings now!!


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## Winspear (Apr 23, 2013)

:O


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## Durero (Apr 23, 2013)

Wow!!!

Awesome experiments going on over there


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## Vostre Roy (Apr 23, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


> :O


 
What the hell... I can't process what is going in the thread...


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## Kroaton (Apr 23, 2013)

"Without sound , there can be no reason." Turned out looking quite clean , though when and why did you decide to make it into a double five ?


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## Winspear (Apr 23, 2013)

It was always going to be a double five , mentioned in the first detailed post I think  Why? Because the double string reinforce even more what this instrument is about, and I had to use the space made from it being a bass somehow, haha. Also the tuning means it has the range of a 6
You should see what I did to the headstock yesterday to get the tuner layout working etc 

It sounds absolutely fantastic and isn't too hard to play. The drone strings aren't activating very much as far as I can tell but it still sounds huge. Not sure why that is. More pics and sound of course soon but I am bordering on failing my degree right now


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## MisterMcCruff (Apr 23, 2013)

Awesome.


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## Berserker (Apr 23, 2013)

I have absolutely no idea what the hell this is, but I want one!!


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## axxessdenied (Apr 23, 2013)

CLIPS, MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!!!


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## vansinn (Apr 23, 2013)

Looks very interesting, waiting for sounds.. 

When you're done going experi_mental_, take off fretboard and deck, and install the drone arrangement inside the body going from upper to lower corner.
It's an el cheapoe, so you can afford to take the chance, and there's gotta be a first for acoustics demolition anyways


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## Konfyouzd (Apr 23, 2013)

Let's see that headstock now... Full body shots and a video or you're deemed false no matter how awesome I happen to think this is...


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## Solodini (Apr 23, 2013)

axxessdenied said:


> CLIPS, MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!!!



**Samuel L. Jackson** "Do you have them?"


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## ixlramp (Apr 23, 2013)

Excellent! good work.

Because Just Intonation is precisely 'in tune' all notes will resonate with all other notes. For example the JI major third is written as 5/4, which means the frequencies are in the ratio 5/4, also this is the interval between the 5th harmonic and the 4th harmonic, also the 5th harmonic of the lower note is in tune with the 4th harmonic of the higher (and this is a way to tune that interval), also they will resonate with each other, the vibrational energy will now flow back and forth between the notes.

In 12ET only notes separated by unison, octave, fourth or fifth will resonate.


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## Berserker (Apr 24, 2013)

Way over my head!


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## Winspear (Apr 24, 2013)

ixlramp said:


> Excellent! good work.
> 
> Because Just Intonation is precisely 'in tune' all notes will resonate with all other notes. For example the JI major third is written as 5/4, which means the frequencies are in the ratio 5/4, also this is the interval between the 5th harmonic and the 4th harmonic, also the 5th harmonic of the lower note is in tune with the 4th harmonic of the higher (and this is a way to tune that interval), also they will resonate with each other, the vibrational energy will now flow back and forth between the notes.
> 
> In 12ET only notes separated by unison, octave, fourth or fifth will resonate.



Indeed , it's very awesome  I listed all these relations in my last post on the first page - it was quite fascinating discovering all those. 

Anyone got any ideas why the main strings might not be activating the sympathetics very well, but plucking the sympathetics activates the main strings?

I'll try make a recording tomorrow night with my new ribbon mic!


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## TheFashel12 (Apr 24, 2013)

You are EPIC


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## hairychris (Apr 24, 2013)

Insanity.


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## redkombat (May 7, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


> :O



i just shit a brick and built a house with it


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## Winspear (May 7, 2013)

Good 
I'm really sorry I didn't get footage of this up yet guys. I am just in the final week of my course and going crazy over work still. Did have a nice jam on it yesterday though, but I still need to lower the bridge significantly! To be honest, I'm not entirely sure the sympathetic strings are going to fly in the current state. I've no idea what's wrong with them but they just don't want to resonate with the mains most of the time, even though it works the other way around. It sounds fantastic just as a microtonal 10 string anyway, and the little that the sympathetics do add is nice!


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## ixlramp (May 8, 2013)

Yeah even without sympathetics that's an awesome instrument.
At first one would think resonance would work equally both ways but obviously it's more complex than that.


EtherealEntity said:


> So it's 14.5" to 15.5" drones, C4 to C5, gauges .018 to .010. All of these will have between 13lbs and 14.5lbs of tension.


I suggest trying much thinner and much looser symps and not use them as drones, the symps on Indian instruments are always around .009 and separate from the drone strings which are at a higher tension for better tone, as far as i know the low mass of the symps helps them to resonate. At the moment you have some thick plains which are also unnecessarily tight, the stiffness of these gauges may add enough damping to reduce resonance.
Also you'll find thinner plains more accurate to tune using your ultra-high ratio tuners haha.
A guitar .008 E has 10 pounds of tension, i suggest much less than this, resonance vibration is of such small amplitude and so gentle the minimum practical tension will be very low. Also i would tune the symps higher to allow thinner gauges, it doesn't need to be C to C as long as it covers an octave. I suggest tuning up a .008 to a low tension and let that set the tuning of the highest symp.


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## vansinn (May 9, 2013)

EtherealEntity said:


> To be honest, I'm not entirely sure the sympathetic strings are going to fly in the current state. I've no idea what's wrong with them but they just don't want to resonate with the mains most of the time, even though it works the other way around. It sounds fantastic just as a microtonal 10 string anyway, and the little that the sympathetics do add is nice!



Hehe, of course they won't resonate much. Just struck me that you mounted them at body's edges, which have very little vibrational modes. SWIM?

Take the deck off, and create a mechanism where they're going angled across from upper 'horn' to lower corner, and so that this lower mount is attached to the underside of the deck, which still will have decent vibrations at this place.

I don't have links ready at hand, but try scooping up info on Pat Metheny's harp guitar, the one with three string sets going across in all directions 
IIRC; it was build by a most awesome female NY builder. I do have the link to her build somewhere; will post if found.


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## MF_Kitten (May 9, 2013)

The sympathetic string assembly needs to be seated in a way that allows it to pick up vibration from the strings and body as much as possible. On a sitar, they are literally IN the neck, UNDER the frets, running under the entire length of the strings.

Remember that the middle of the big round part of the body (where the bridge is seated) is where the vibrations are the strongest.

they will also have to be looser as far as tension goes, so they'll be easier to vibrate. And even if they vibrate really hard, you won't be able to hear them at all unless the body "amplifies" them. Which means they need to be hooked on to a part of the instrument that vibrates a lot!

My idea: Buy a typical top-mounted classical guitar bridge. Mount it onto the guitar, somewhat close to the existing bridge, so it's sitting where the vibrations are at. Make the strings go diagonally across from below the existing bridge, over the sound hole (if possible), and ending at the tuners at the upper bout (or nodule or whatever... the missing "cut" from the "single cut" shape )


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## silent_k (May 9, 2013)

vansinn said:


> I don't have links ready at hand, but try scooping up info on Pat Metheny's harp guitar, the one with three string sets going across in all directions
> IIRC; it was build by a most awesome female NY builder. I do have the link to her build somewhere; will post if found.



The luthier you're thinking of is Linda Manzer: Manzer Guitars - Manzer Guitars. There's a photo of a beautiful harp guitar on this page constructed as MF Kitten has suggested. Her harp guitar for Pat Metheny actually had 48 strings -- there's a brief Wikipedia article about it, and Manzer (with a photo) here: Linda Manzer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


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## vansinn (May 11, 2013)

^ yep, it's Linda I was thinking of, very special stuff she does


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## MF_Kitten (May 11, 2013)

Linda Manzer made a sitar/guitar hybrid with symp/drone strings mounted in a similar way as what I suggested. It also has a buzz bridge and all that jazz


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## Kroaton (May 11, 2013)

Her inlay work is incredible.


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