Official Luthiers Forum!

Or so I thought....

I've built a classical guitar. I glued on the bridge over the weekend and strung it up on Sunday. It sounded wonderful. What a relief for my first guitar!

Today I loosened off the strings, lowered the action at the nut, and tensioned it back up again. Now there was a terrible buzz whenever I played the low E-string - a buzz just like the buzz inside the dashboard of a 1999 Volkwagen Golf that drove me nuts for 10 years. I took everything apart again, checked the nut slot clearances, tightened up the truss rod, checked for loose tuner parts, and was despondent thinking it must be a loose brace.

My three year old had tripped over the guitar case and fell on top of the guitar earlier today. I love her, but that's worth a beating . Even worse, when I shook the guitar, something "clunked" inside . I ran out to the shop to get my mechanics mirror...and found I have been playing the guitar for a few days with the bridge gluing caul still taped inside the guitar .

What a relief. Did I ever drink a big Scotch after all that worry.

Now the interesting part:

With the bridge gluing caul taped under the bridge, the guitar volume was much lower, but the clarity or separation of the notes was greater.

With the caul removed, the volume is noticeably louder - now much too loud for my preference - the bass response is higher, and sympathetic vibrations (vibration of the other strings when another string is played) is much greater.

Overall I prefer the sound with the caul taped under the bridge.

Pull the bridge and replace it with African blackwood. That'll quiet it down

Or sell it and build another. Sounds like you've achieved what I strive for; loud and complex.

Try engelmann and maple if you want clarity and note separation. Much more "tame" than stuff like redwood and rosewood, IME.

First time I've ever heard someone complain about a Classical Guitar being too loud. Loud and brash maybe but not just loud of itself.
Play it. Give it a couple of months before deciding to do anything. Anyway, why can't you play it PPP if you need to?

Is it common practice nowadays to install an adjustable trussrod in a classical guitar ?

It is in this part of the world.

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

Heh, I've done that! Why is this new guitar so dead sounding?

I wouldn't change the guitar at this point. Just go a hair stiffer with the next top, in the region around the bridge, and see if that one has better clarity and separation.

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Jim Kirby
kirby@udel.edu

Sounds like someone needs to put his toys away when hes done playing ...

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Thanks. I pretty closely followed the plans by Bogdanovich. When I started construction I deliberately told myself to not overbuild things, like I usually do. The top ended up a bit lighter than Bogdanovich's recommendations. It's nice to have an idea of how to approach improvements for #2.

My guitar instructor was always trying to get me to play louder. At home I just play for myself on the couch while the kids are sleeping. I've never liked loud noises and prefer to play quietly. With my steel string guitar I can fingerpick fairly hard without making too much noise. With this new guitar I just touch the strings lightly and the noise booms out; loud enough that it's a bit uncomfortable to my ears.

That's not possible! Every Guitar that I've ever come across (thousands) is capable of playing ppp. Sounds like you need to relearn how to play quietly.

a bigger bridge with more mass might do the trick to quiet that guitar down! That, or you can possibly glue additional material where you have the caul taped?

I am pretty bad guitar player and this is my first nylon string guitar. No doubt I'll tame the beast but the volume really suprised me; much louder than any nylon string I've played in the stores.

Thanks
Steven

yeah that's no flaw. you should be happy!

I have been playing for 40 year but always played overbuilt factory guitars and did not know any better. When someone finally put a really guitar built for sound and not warranty issues in my hand, it was a real eye opener. Like holding a wild animal! I bought that guitar. It took awhile to get use to playing a live, responsive guitar. Now I can not play the dead factory guitar. Just no fun.

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EddieLee