Official Luthiers Forum!

I recently ordered a ToneRite with the full intention of sending it back after trying. I stuck it on an old parlor prototype that always sounded a bit tubby. 72 hrs at med/high and the difference was fairly significant. I still thought about sending it back. I had strung up a new Mahogany OM about 4 -5 days prior and it was staying in tune. Appeared to have undergone the initial settling in and was fairly stable. I stuck on the ToneRite for 48 hrs at med/high and the action came up probably 1/32" at the 12th. I did the final setup and intonation and stuck it on another 24 hrs. and nothing changed. It sounded absolutely fabulous. I think this thing might really be good for duplicating the first few months of life where the action slowly comes up and the tone starts to develop. I decided to keep it mainly for use on new builds. (Plus it had a very positive effect on the sound) I'll report back when I have more data.

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

you mean some data

Mike <--Note the winkie!

If it was just the sound I think I would have sent it back Mike. That will happen by itself over time. The thing that impressed me was how it seemed to loosen up a new guitar so it behaved like an instrument that was 4 or 5 months old. I've built 38 instruments now and have a pretty good idea when they have reached a stable point for initial setup. For me it seems like 4 or 5 days after being strung up. I sell a lot out of a store and I've noticed they hold their setup initially but if one does not sell for a while it usually comes up a 32nd or so over 3 or 4 months.
The guitar I used the Tonerite on had stabilized, I set it up , and put the gadget on for 72 hrs. The action at the 12th came up a good 32nd. I re-did the setup and I'm very interested to see what it's like 6 months from now. It's going to a professional fingerstyle blues player that will really give it a workout. If the action stays stable this thing could be a big help getting a guitar fully settled in right out of the gate and maybe avoid having to tweak it later. I also have it on another new OM that will go to the store so I'll have two instruments to watch. I decided to take a chance on it. If it does not do what I hope you'll probably see a Tonerite on Ebay!
Terry

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Terry, hopefully you know I am just poking. Its good that you can see a difference.

The real problem for testing is that it would require a significant population of identical guitars (and ToneRites) to do the test. No one will do it. Perhaps not even the manufacturer. You do have empirical evidence based on experience. The price of the device is just right. And it is so to prevent excessive discussion of data.

Did you log on to their forum now that you are an owner? Tell us what you find.

Mike

I completely understand Mike. I was in medicine for 37 years. We used to have a saying "without data you are just another a-- hole with an opinion". I don't think we'll ever have any meaningful data on tone improvement but I think it may be very possible to get some data on whether the device can produce a new guitar that has settled in similar to one that is 6-12 months old. With the recession there are a lot of high end guitars hanging on music store walls. (A few of mine included!) That is a controlled environment. When a new guitar arrives let it sit a week or so, set it up, put the Tonerite on for 72 hrs. Measure any change, and if it does not sell measure any change in action every 3 months. The store where I sell believes in the device and has one so I'm going to see if they are interested in doing a little study.

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Terry,

I read about some guy that had built a "pink noise" box to house the guitar while being exposed to vibrations. Most sellers put their high end instruments in a closed room. Seems you could achieve the same results with a speaker in the middle of the room hooked to a tone generator at some useful volume. But, people will intefere with this since they will come in and play the guitars (as they should).

Seems to me what is needed is a source for 2 or more production guitars from Martin or Taylor. Odds are good they will be relatively identical... (same day serials and all of that) but not sure if that is as important as it seems. The point being, you characterize two or more guitars before the toneright, then expose half the population to the toneright, and the others get no such treatment. If your population is sufficient, then you should be able to draw useful conclusions from test data. This is objective testing. I would also include double blind subjective testing as well. If all that correlates, you have a sound conclusion to present.

The downside of this is that if we prove there is an appreciable difference, then the toneright price will most likely go up!

Mike

Excellent thoughts Mike. A really valid study even of just the structural effects would be a lot of work. After sleeping on it I may just wallow in the arena of pseudoscience for a while.
Terry

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Terry,

Is it possible that this "accelarated initial 32nd come-up" was partly due to the laying position of your guitar? I mean, my guitar was sitting on a guitar shelf that doesn't touch the neck while being tonerited.

BTW, I lent my tonerite to a friend weeks ago and just had a homemade version on one of my guitars. I made it out of a $5 60Hz air-pump tonight, and the noise from the vibrated guitar is remarkably resemble to the real thing.

Hard to say, I've got to use it a lot more to get a feel for how useful it is. I bet your pump model will work just as well. A client sent me this:

http://www.siminoff.net/pages/siminoff_ ... mping.html

Creative way to make a little pocket change.

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Is that Black Sabbath on 78 speed played in reverse that they are blasting that poor guitar with???

I missed this discussion in real time and wanted to add a few things if I may please.

First regardless of all the nay sayers I can see where this device may be beneficial especially with just-off-the-bench new guitars. Although a Tonerite is certainly not the only way to break-in a new guitar it does represent one of the only put-it-on-auto-pilot and leave the shop method that I have seen.

Also to me Lutherie is both art and science and at times where the line is is not very clear. If anyone engaged in guitar building is requiring data at all times to support any conclusion this seems like a great way to get hopelessly stuck in the mud and spin one's wheels instead of producing guitars.

Don't get me wrong I greatly appreciate the left brain sorts and I also greatly benefit from their discoveries and sharing. My point is that to me tone and sound are a lot like beauty. When you see a beautiful woman (or man) do you need data to have your switch flipped? We like what we like if we are the sort that is capable of liking anything at all... and many of us need no better reason then the perception that what we see, hear, or feel is pleasing to us as individuals.

Has anyone ever developed an algorithm for determining if the tone of one guitar over another is going to be more successful in the market place by being perceived as more pleasing to the player/listener? Obviously not and if any of us ever did that I doubt that we would be discussing it on Internet forums.

So in a nut shell I am not willing to discount the Tonerite because of the absence of hard data. For as long as people have been building guitars we talk about how guitars "open up" or "break-in" as they are played and as time passes. Were these folks smoking the drapes too???? Where is their data to support this notion that guitars actually "open up" or "break-in???" It's heresy I tell ya and these folks claiming to be able to hear that a guitar has opened up need to be burned at the stake...

My point is that there are a number of notions in Lutherie that I can think of that are considered to be true with little or no debate and there is NO data to support these notions, none, nada....

Lastly and geeze I am long winded... your prospective clients are going to make judgments right before your very eyes that are not supported by any data, science, studies, experiments, what-ever. It's what humans do - again we like what we like and no one is going to change this for the most part.

My hats off to the Al Carruths, David Hurds, Terry here for trying the Tonerite and many others who toil to understand with science and data what we humans have not been able to fully understand prior. Nonetheless (non the less for my friend the Padma) the rest of us including our clients are going to continue to do what humans always have done for better or worse - be judgmental with or without data, like what we like for whatever reason and life goes on....

BTW I picked up an aquarium pump for $8 and I am going to try to open up an early build that is over-braced and never gets played.....

Here are pics of my $5 version:

Cool. You'll have to let us know how it works.

_________________
It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

This pump actually vibrates a bit more than the real thing. The adjustment of power (with a dimmer) is not as smooth, tho. In other words, it almost has only two settings: the weakest and the strongest. I am having a stiff experimental guitar of mine processed. It holds better vertical than the original, which depends on the friction of rubber.

My latest classical which was vibrated by ToneRite for about ten days, has remained very open since I lent my friend the real thing. It has a mature sound and the easy playing feel of left hand is not like a new guitar at all.