Contemporary Acoustic Guitar Design and Build - Reviews

[Trevor Gore]

Many of you by now have ordered and received "the book", and many of you have at least started reading it, albeit in some cases in some rather strange places (viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3605 !) In this forum and others there has been some very positive feedback and both Gerard and I have had very positive private feedback, for which we thank those who took the trouble - greatly appreciated.

At the risk of shooting holes in both feet, and exceeding Bob's benevolence, (catch him on his birthday, might get away with it!), I'd like to invite anyone who has read the book and who feels so inclined to contribute a short review in this thread, with the hope that those looking for reviews can find them easily and know that they have not been "sanitised".

So, over to you guys. You'll find me ducking for cover!

Trevor Gore.

[Kim]

I think this thread is a great idea Trev,

I have my copies but have not had a chance to really get to the nitty gritty but what I have read to this point is fabulous and quite clearly the best money I have spent on luthierie in a long while and the best I have spent on lutherie related literature ever.

Essential reading for all levels of the sport as far as I am concerned.

Cheers

Kim

[kiwigeo]

Been sitting here for a week on an oil rig doing nothing.....if the books weren't so heavy I could have had Book 1 read by now.

[charangohabsburg]

=> Here. <=

Not requested and...

...in Spanish.
Sorry about that, but this is how things go sometimes.

My special thanks go to Luis Briso de Montiano who made sure that the grammar and stile of my writing would fit the high standards of the books I was writing about.

To those who are tempted to run my review through a translating machine, be warned: without having tried it with my review I can tell you that the result will be somewhere between hilarious nonsense, inaccuracy and offence to the author of the translated text.

Maybe I'll translate my review to English, or I'll post at least a shortcut of my Spanish review (if there do not appear other, better reviews in English before I can get it done).

For now just this (the 6th paragraph in my review - one of the main points), more or less literally, carelessly and not completely translated (extenuating circumstances are, that neither Spanish nor English is my native tongue) :

The quantity and complexity of the mathematical formulas developed [= presented] in the book may intimidate the reader. Although the authors show the expansion (?) [of the math. formulas] they omit extensive explications which could help to understand. It is indispensable to be familiar with [a certain level of] mathematics to be able to follow the whole math. However, the authors made it possible that one can also understand the results without following the complete mathematical expansion in order that people who are not extremely versed in mathematics also can benefit of the book [volume 1, design].

La cantidad y complejidad de las fórmulas matemáticas que se desarrollan en el libro puede llegar a intimidar al lector porque, aunque los autores muestran el desarrollo de las mismas, omiten explicaciones matemáticas extensas que podrían ayudar a mejorar su comprensión. Para seguir todos los pasos del desarrollo de las fórmulas es imprescindible estar familiarizado con la matemática. De todas formas, los autores han logrado que se puedan entender bien los resultados aun sin comprender por completo el desarrollo matemático. Así que también los lectores sin grandes conocimientos matemáticos podrán aprovecharse del libro y entender de forma general cómo los autores han llegado a los resultados y conclusiones que presentan.

It may help you to understand my point of view concerning "understandability" of the first volume if I tell you that I have passed through some advanced mathematical education more than 25 years back, that I have used that knowledge on a professional basis during some years in a research centre, and that since then I have been "mathematically lazy". I had to get some old books down from the shelf to be able to chew through (and fully understand) the 2nd chapter of the 1st volume. I would have to disappoint those who might want me to ask for math explanations because eating and feeding are two different pairs of shoes.

Last but not least, I have to confess that so far, (August 30, 2011) I have only read (and I believe mostly understood) volume 1 (design), and only "thoroughly cross-read" volume 2 (build). I'm looking forward to see a report from the one who will have built the first guitar strictly according to volume 2 of Contemporary Acoustic Guitar.

Cheers,

[jeffhigh]

Maths..........
Thankfully we have spreadsheets.
I'm an ex engineer but I really hate doing calcs these days

Even if a lot of a chapter appears to beyond your comprehension at first, read the conclusions and recommendations at the end of the chapter, they are easier to understand and then dip back into the detail as you can.
The beauty of the design volume is that
- it gives you objective means of evaluation a guitars performance( monopole mobility)
-it shows you how to find the various mode frequencies and gives guidance on both absolute values and relationships between them
-it gives you tools to evaluate your raw plates and work out target thicknesses
-it shows what changing stiffness, mass etc have on a plates frequency and on other related frequencies

and much more

Gotta go back with more comments later

[Trevor Gore]

There's a few more "one line" reviews here:

http://www.goreguitars.com.au/main/page ... ction.html

Cheers, T.

[ChuckM]

I'm going to be lazy and just repost a review I put on another site...

I have read quite a few guitar making books over the last 35 years. I've felt that few of them really added much to Irving Sloane's book, slim though it was. In fact Sloane's is one of the few books that I've dragged with me over all those years. But a lot of research has been done over the years and I hadn't been able to find a decent summary until now.

I've been working with the "Guitar Design and Build" books for the last several weeks. IMHO this is the book to get for those of us who've been around for a while and want a summary of the physics of guitars and what that means in terms of working that understanding into your building processes. There is enough to chew on if you really want to get into how it all works, but it also has good summaries that cut through the math for those who can't really follow it. If you want to strike out on your own fantasy ideas, there are methods to evaluate how your new design stacks up against the old standards, not to mention some of Trevor's super guitars.

Personally I think the design volume by itself is worth the price, but the build volume also has some things of interest to experienced builders, especially as it covers several styles of guitars and includes references to the concepts in the design book along the way. There are 4 full size body/bracing plans at the end of the build book as well. It's full color, glossy photos and hard cover, complete with sturdy dust covers.

Thanks Trevor and Gerard, nice work !

[Dominic]

Apart from keeping me glued since I got them, and more excited about guitar building than I have been for ages, I have found these books refreshingly honest and they dispel many myths that have become accepted as “fact” in the lutherie community. The problem is that these “facts” have no empirical basis. It has always annoyed me that debates about design and plate tuning (OLF not here) can decent into voodoo lutherie and people choosing the “believe” one thing or another rather than thinking about things in a more rigorous and methodical way, testing and comparing results. Its not a religion but a portion of the lutherie community and of the buying public treat it as if it was. Some of the things that I have seen written on the web by supposed guitar gurus are crazy. It has polarised the community and makes it difficult to discuss design and sound quality in a scientific way and so it tends not to get discussed. Even on this forum the vast majority of discussion is about the carpentry of guitar making and very little is devoted to sound quality. And I believe this holds back the development of the guitar.

One of the problems has been that we are talking different languages and trying to describe something that is very difficult to describe. Perhaps this is one aspect where people don’t want to share but I think what has been missing has been a consistent framework to understand what we are aiming for, what a good guitar is, and we have not had tools that enable us to accurately analyse and compare guitars among ourselves. This book has the potential to change all that. It provides a rigorous framework to measure, analyse and adjust the quality of sound which is not as subjective as people think according to references in the design sections.
Most of the techniques in the book I have heard of before now but I have never seen them all laid out in such a systematic way and explained so well. And I never see guides to tuning that give so much information and data about the authors own guitars. They are usually more generic, use subjective words to describe what to aim for and seem to hold back the last piece. It is a great thing that Trevor and Gerard have done for the lutherie community - opening up their brains to us and uploading all those years of experience. I look forward to the day when along with pictures of neat binding and cool headstock veneers, we also start seeing spectrographs of the guitar frequency responses and some more technical data. I think we as a community will all benefit from such an approach and will be able to push the craft further and faster than ever. These volumes will become seminal works on the subject and it makes me proud that they were written by fellow Australians.

Cheers
Dom

[woodrat]

Big Thumbs Up Dom, Great Post and I agree with you about getting excited again about building especially having this great resource. The more I read it the more light it shines on things that I have been struggling with in my building. Trevor and Gerard have been seriously very generous with this book and have not held back and I am sure that all that read the books will appreciate this fact. They certainly have given a great gift to all of us who are trying to make instruments worthy of the effort and materials we put into them.

John

[Trevor Gore]

In the current edition of American Lutherie, the quarterly publication of the Guild of American Luthiers there's a full review of "The book" by R. M. Mottola. For those of you yet to receive your copy of AL #109, you can read a reprint of the review here.

[Nick]

In the current edition of American Lutherie, the quarterly publication of the Guild of American Luthiers there's a full review of "The book" by R. M. Mottola. For those of you yet to receive your copy of AL #109, you can read a reprint of the review here.

Read that Trevor & even though I've got the books I valued Mottola's review more than some I've read of other books, thought it was a well laid out & accurate review of yours & Gerard's lifetime of experience. Should garner more sales on the other side of the globe for you hopefully! We on the underside already know it is the new bible to guitar construction & the value it adds to this craft

[charangohabsburg]

Glad to see this review is now online!

When a couple of days ago I was reading the hardcopy of the review I thought that it would be nice to order a second set of books, just because I agree so much with what Mottola wrote!

[Clancy]

Maths..........

When I was doing my Electrical Engineering degree I always felt that the content would be a lot more interesting if I was learning them for fun rather than under the pressure of exams and qualifications.
All these years later these books have proved me right (for once...)
I really enjoyed working through the theory to the logical outcomes.
As long as Trevor doesn't set an exam to test us on it!

Yet to put anything into practice, but I'm definately better armed for the future.

(My only (extremely minor) grip is in the Build book, where some sequence of photos run by columns and other sequences run by rows.)

[weslewis]

Apart from keeping me glued since I got them, and more excited about guitar building than I have been for ages, I have found these books refreshingly honest and they dispel many myths that have become accepted as “fact” in the lutherie community. The problem is that these “facts” have no empirical basis. It has always annoyed me that debates about design and plate tuning (OLF not here) can decent into voodoo lutherie and people choosing the “believe” one thing or another rather than thinking about things in a more rigorous and methodical way, testing and comparing results. Its not a religion but a portion of the lutherie community and of the buying public treat it as if it was. Some of the things that I have seen written on the web by supposed guitar gurus are crazy. It has polarised the community and makes it difficult to discuss design and sound quality in a scientific way and so it tends not to get discussed. Even on this forum the vast majority of discussion is about the carpentry of guitar making and very little is devoted to sound quality. And I believe this holds back the development of the guitar.

One of the problems has been that we are talking different languages and trying to describe something that is very difficult to describe. Perhaps this is one aspect where people don’t want to share but I think what has been missing has been a consistent framework to understand what we are aiming for, what a good guitar is, and we have not had tools that enable us to accurately analyse and compare guitars among ourselves. This book has the potential to change all that. It provides a rigorous framework to measure, analyse and adjust the quality of sound which is not as subjective as people think according to references in the design sections.
Most of the techniques in the book I have heard of before now but I have never seen them all laid out in such a systematic way and explained so well. And I never see guides to tuning that give so much information and data about the authors own guitars. They are usually more generic, use subjective words to describe what to aim for and seem to hold back the last piece. It is a great thing that Trevor and Gerard have done for the lutherie community - opening up their brains to us and uploading all those years of experience. I look forward to the day when along with pictures of neat binding and cool headstock veneers, we also start seeing spectrographs of the guitar frequency responses and some more technical data. I think we as a community will all benefit from such an approach and will be able to push the craft further and faster than ever. These volumes will become seminal works on the subject and it makes me proud that they were written by fellow Australians.

Cheers
Dom

What he said!!!!!! especially about some of the cow excrement that seems to flow around some of the subjects like plate tuning , I do this as a hobby, at times an addiction, and right now I am waiting on the lacquer to finish drying on my 11th , which is completely my own design using the books as study guides and incorporating falcate inspired bracing using carbon fiber , can't wait till its strung up to see how it sounds.
I will say the math can be overwhelming for a simple guy like myself but the summaries help especially if the subject matter is re studied, what I would suggest is to make available some spread sheets for download for guys like me that don't use spreadsheets in our daily lives and have to spend a few hours getting past the learning curves, that said Trevor was kind enough to run numbers for intonation when I posted on the forum, thanks...

GREAT BOOKS!!!!!!!!! best thing for Lutherie since the go bar deck!!! IMHO

[peter.coombe]

I have read the design book and am about half way through the build book. Overall, great books, best I have read on any topic relating to Lutherie. Well written and the information is backed up with measurements and/or reference citations. This seems to be a rare occurrence in our profession which unfortunately often leads to a lot of BS. Trevor's PhD shows. There are a lot of ideas in these books that will keep me occupied for a long time, and they have pride of place amongst my reference books. There are just so many good things in the books I want to try. I just need more time (and a few more guitar customers!), have had to drop guitars for a while to work on some mandolins.

Well done Trevor and Gerard.

Peter

[Trevor Gore]

I have received lots of very complimentary emails since the books have been out (thanks everyone who took the time to write, your thoughts are really appreciated) and now and again comes one from someone who's "been there, done that". Marc runs an overseas company making top shelf guitars. Here's what he had to say:

"Hi Trevor,

I’ve had a good look through the books over the last few hours.

I’ve been in the guitar industry for over 25 years; I started with a love of guitars and wood from a very early age, couple this with my early working years with an aerospace company - it shaped my ‘thinking’ as a Luthier. I studied physics, ultrasonics, magnetics and production systems; to cut a long story short I just couldn’t let go of the wood at the end of the day……at the same time I never lost touch with the reality of physics and the practical elements of being able to measure and understand ones work to support ones position regards guitar making lore.

Some of the ‘Golden Truths’ I have heard over the years have become guitar making lore and are accepted as absolute truths – even when they break very well know laws of physics that we learned at school – we are a curious bunch indeed.

Anyway, not too long ago I happened upon your website, as I looked over the pages I became more and more interested in what you were saying…..and then I noticed your books; me being curious is an understatement to say the least so I clicked the ‘Buy It’ button, then I saw the $ value you had placed on your work...I still clicked BUY as all I had read indicated this was no run of the mill book.

I’ve purchased several expensive guitar making books in the past, on a practical level only a few were excellent, most were informative and only 1 of my books had any sound physics in just a few pages. I was curious to have a good read when the your books arrived.

Today they arrived, only a few days after I ordered, I did as any child would do when presented with a carefully boxed prezzie – I ripped off the packaging as fast as I could and shut myself away for a few hours under the guise of ‘daddy needs a siesta right NOW’; with coffee & books in hand I settled down to a 4 hour siesta.

The books - value for money is astounding! To have on hand the volume of data and research material for the price I paid is the best value I have ever spent on Luthiers books. They are concisely and meticulously written and offer a real depth of understanding and knowledge to the reader.

For me the books divide perfectly between the volumes - vol 1 is for my head and vol 2 is for my hands.

They mix tradition perfectly with technology; everything is based on scientific observation, measurement & explanation, often dispelling the long held ‘Holy Grails’ of the luthiers art.

Volume 1 is a mine of information for the technically minded and volume 2 walks through the entire build process implementing the practical side to the theory found in book 1.

To sum up – for anyone wanting to deepen their understanding of the fundamental elements in the design & function of acoustic guitars then these books are a MUST.

These are simply the best books on the market.

You can quote me on any of the above.

The books are great, they’re not going on the bookshelf – they’re going on my bedside table".

Thank you Marc!