Official Luthiers Forum!

I know there is a forum for this but it doesn't seem to be very active.. My next project is going to be a resonator using my 12 fret body style and thought I would solicit some opinions … thought I would just kind of wing it with what very little I know but with ideas I have seen on various websites etc. …
so any insights , opinions, tricks and tips, design considerations would be appreciated..

and pics!!

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MK5acoustics.com

I think you'll find this to be useful for a start:

http://www.mimf.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1697&sid=afd43f90c0039a3851fa69e1f8b2a891

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I saw that thread...just have a lot of questions , for instance does the top have any influence on the sound, since the top is + or - 90 % of the sound on a steel string , how much does it affect a resonator???? thought about incorporating some carbon fiber into the design,..how about total weight, side stiffness and so on, I see Beard makes a 10.5 inch biscuit, is it louder than a 9.5 inch..I am sure that is really subjective like tone is....are there monopole mobility issues that can be tweaked????? with body depth ????

I have had way too much time on my hands today......

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MK5acoustics.com

Unfortunately I don't know anything about resonators except that I'd like to build one someday. I'm sure somebody will come along who has some experience.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

The Resonator forum is quiet but it will perk up any time someone posts there so I would invite you to do so.
But most if not all the reso people read this forum as well.

I can't comment on the larger cone, but the 9 1/2 National cone is the most popular cone for biscuit bridge resonators. There are metal body resonators by other makers using the larger biscuit cone, but don't know of a wood bodied one, though I'm sure such a thing does exist. I don't believe the top wood effects the tone much, as it has to be fairly rigid to allow the cone to resonate freely. I've made a few of different woods and my favorite sounding ones were made entirely of Finnish birch plywood, and there are a lot of high end resos from Beard and other makers made entirely of Birch ply. But you'll get a lot of different opinions on that.
The top needs to be braced well and some use a neck stick to support the soundwell. I have just used a bolt on neck and braced the top well with birch ply to get the necessary support. Check out Kent Schoonover's website for a cool top bracing concept. He makes spider bridge resonators, but his cool bracing concepts expand the possibilities.
I've stuck to bodies under 15" wide in the lower bout, as that seems to be average and close to 4" depth. I made a deeper one, almost 4 3/4 and it didn't seem to improve on the tone so I'm not sure deeper is better, but my experience is quite limited. I'd love to here other ideas on body size. Most of the Nationals are 4" or less. I have an El Trovador and it is 4" at the tail and 3 1/2" at the neck.
I advise buying the cover plate, biscuit and cone before doing anything so you can make a mock up to calculate your neck angle so your strings fit under the cover plate.
Keep us posted, but please post in the Resonator forum. That forum is ready to respond and needs the activity.

Kent

are the tops radiused??? or just the back

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MK5acoustics.com

Good question. I assume the top would be flat. Maybe someone who actually knows will chime in but it seems that a radiused top would add a whole lot of unecessary work. hmmmmmm

Just had one of my student's Beard spider apart .. its a flat top ...

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

Yes, the tops are flat. I use a 15 foot radius on my backs, but my National doesn't look like it has that much radius. I think a lot of the traditional square neck resonators have a flat back so I'm not sure it matters much.

Kent

I assume the coverplates are pretty generic as to fit????? thought I would use a beard cone and spider but a gold coverplate , soundholes and tailpiece I saw on ebay...

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MK5acoustics.com

Let me jump in real quick and answer a couple of question. First, I own three resonators - an old Dobro spider, a brass bodied biscuit and a home made wooden tricone. Different conewell configurations are used to support the cones - here are pictures of mine - the spider





The biscuit





and the tricone



a blatent show off picture of the finished tricone (there are more at the reso subforum)



The spider and biscuit photo show the neck sticks commonly used on resonators, however the tricone has a plain old bolt on neck.

As you know, the different cone configurations have very different sounds - spiders have that sweet singing long sustain that we associate with bluegrass dobro, biscuits have short attack and sustain, tricones are somewhere in between. Metal bodied guitars have a brash nasty metallic sound, wood seems to mellow that a lot but you still get the reso cone tone. My wood tricone can sound almost acoustic when played gently with flesh and nails, but gets very nasty with picks and an old wine bottle slide.

The tops are always flat. Cones are different size depending on the configuration - before you start buy all the hardware so you can take careful measurments. Normally resonators have no compensation - they intonate pretty badly when fretted up the neck. Most have neck sticks - you set the action by adjusting and shimming the neck angle. Most are somewhere around 25 inch scale, depending on your playing style you might like a wide flat fretboard (better for slide). Most, but not all, are 12 fretters - some of the old Nat tricones were even 11-1/2. Bodies are roughly OM size - make sure you have the room for your conewell and all of the support bracing.

Beard has good plans for a spider bridge which you can build either square or round neck. They also have plans for a metal biscuit that would give you a start for a woodie. StewMac had an article and rough plans for a biscuit

http://www.stewmac.com/freeinfo/Buildin ... honic.html

and I have an autocad drawing (and pdf) of the top of a tricone that might be helpful. And I did a build thread on another forum that might help.

http://bigroadblues.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=11037

Last comment, when you start laying things out work from the bridge location and body joint as your starting point - unlike an acoustic you don't get to move your bridge around at the end of the build.

I added a bunch of measurements and other information to the MIMF thread. Seems kind of silly to be duplicating at two different forums. And going back to one of your questions



Make sure that you understand that 9 inch cones are biscuit bridge, 10-1/2 are spiders. They are two entirely different critters. The materials affect the sound, but in my opinion, only slightly. Woodies were traditionally build from birch plywood, higher end used fancy woods. Metal ones are either steel or bell brass - they do have a slightly different sound but its the cone that does the work. Buy the best cone you can - Quarterman or Beard for a spider, National "hot rod" for biscuit or tricone.

Don't know how you plan to use the CF - these things are heavy to begin with. Depending on the style of cone, tuning and strings a spider will be under a lot more tension than an acoustic (dobro tuning has the bottom two tuned up). With a biscuit the cone is the weak part - always tune down to G or D or you risk crushing the cone (ask how I know). Neck joint is a weak point.

I did make my tricone deeper - but since there are so few wooden tricones there isn't much to compare it with. Made it not fit a standard case - big bucks for a custom one. I know that in the spider world there is trend to deeper bodies and doing away with the sound ring entirely. There is a reso specific forum out there that deals mostly with spiders

this Is going to be a fun build..ordered my parts today...Beard cone and spider , and some gold parts off of ebay.. I have been doing my studing and have a pretty good idea of what I want to build..

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MK5acoustics.com

There are 10 1/2 inch biscuit cones. I think the old OMI Dobro metal body round neck guitars use a 10 1/2 inch biscuit cone. Not sure who else used them. Paul Beard currently sells them.

Kent

I have built one resonator that was a 12 fret. I used my L-OO molds. For a resonator cone, I used a national 9 1/2".with a biscuit bridge. The top was dead flat and stiff. I actually used a piece of flamed cedar that was to flimsy for an acoustic and epoxied it to a piece of spruce. For the neck I used my typical mortice and tenon bolt on joint. For support I built a baltic birch frame under the top that connected to soundwell. The soundwell was baltic birch as well. I did NOT make the neck like national (Banjo like with a long neck stick)

Picts below.

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Andy Z.
http://www.lazydogguitars.com

Looks nice! How is the sound?

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MK5acoustics.com

Thos OOO bodied tricone that I built a while back has a flat top. However, to avoid a knuckle in the fretboard, I fabricated and glued a small wedge beneath the board from the 12th fret to just short of the f/b end.

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michael propsom
www.propsomguitars.com

you definatly want to have all the parts on hand when you start to build so you can verify the measurements. Cone , spider or biscuit , coverplate and tail piece. A OOO body shapes works very well. My wood body was from a Martin kit without the soundhole cut into the top. the metal tricone was from the beard plans and a template from MIMF. Read their library on the subject, most of it's all there.

I am going to use my own body style which is a medium body with a cutaway...it's going to be a round neck and I have a pretty good idea on how I want to build it , trying to work out the neck angle on a flat top???? has anyone radiused a top??? don't really like the shimming the fretboard idea...right now waiting on parts then I will draw it up in cad and figure how to tackle it ..

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MK5acoustics.com

you can radius the upper bout if you like. you can also bend the fb extension if you want as if it"s fallaway. You aren't going to be fretting up there.

Wes, you don't have to install a wedge (not a shim. To my mind a shim is a uniform thickness its entire length and width). If you were to build a completely flat top, you may do as Chris suggested and give the neck "fall away". Probably the same thing that I call a knuckle. And if you don't play up there a knuckle is no problem. Although I don't fret that high up the board, I made this prototype so a person could play that high and still have accurate intonation. As far as a radiused/domed top, I think you could run into some trouble seating the resonator cone or coverplate.

Everyone's advice to have all of the parts on hand before you get started is spot on. You can draw mockups all you want, but I found it invaluable to have the parts in my possession for setting the neck angle & compensation. My recommendation would be to go with the standard National style cone with the biscuit bridge.

By the way, Freeman gave me some great tips, and specs to help with my project. As far as body depth, I stayed shallow--in fact went with the same body depth as my 1930 roundneck tricone. It was really a help to have that around for reference.

Oh, and I have quite a few photos of my project on my Photobucket page. My name over there is "highdrawlicks". You're welcome to visit that site and check them out. It's on listed as Rosewood Tricone on my library page. Might not be a great deal of help since it's a tricone, but you might glean something from it.

Good luck with the project. It should be fun.

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michael propsom
www.propsomguitars.com

If you wedge the FB tongue it will look fine. No one will even notice so don't worry about that and it really is a none issue.

You can't radius the top in the lower bout as you need a flat surface for the cone and cover plate. I sanded the head block down about a 1/16 inch and sloped the upper bout down to give me the neck angle I needed.
Sounds like you are planning on using a spider bridge/cone on yours. I have built spider bridge square necks and biscuit round necks but not a spider bridge round neck. Cliff Eberhardt and Eric Taylor play spider bridge round necks made by Tony Granata and a friend of mine has a Paul Beard. They sound different but very cool. I want one.
I would love to make one of those and look forward to your progress.

Kent