Violin Forum/Message Board

[Devlinski]

How far from the end of the fiddle should the tailpiece be, the length of the gut etc. and is this critical and why?

[Michael Darnton]

The length of the G string between bridge and tailpiece saddle should be 55mm. Ideally the tailpiece should be stabilized by almost resting on the saddle at the other end.

Having the afterlength right adds a sizzle to the sound that most players like, and helps carrying power. 55mm does not work with every instrument, but it does with most. Sometimes you will need to mess around a bit to find the exactly right length, but 55mm is usually fine. On violins of marginal quality you won't be able to draw this sizzle out, no matter what. In those cases, generally, a longer afterlength results in a "wilder" violin, and a shorter one makes the violin "tamer". Wilder can be good up to a point, until things become wolfy and unstable.

Stabilizing the tailpiece by not having too much between it and the saddle pumps more of the movement of the strings through the bridge = just plain more.

Tailpieces are available in different overall lengths from 105mm to 112mm to adjust for this.

[John Cadd]

I found only 2 topics on tailpieces so I might as well keep the numbers down .
What were the original tailpieces like made by Stradivari. He probably worked out something useful .
I responded to a player on Violinist .com once .He suggested replacing the tailpiece with a metal arrangement with a brass piece to hold the strings and a simple thick wire connection to the bottom end .So I made one as he suggested and straight away knew it killed the tone stone dead.Compared to a rosewood standard design it was totally wrong.
I had tried comparing ebony and rosewood. The rosewood had a warmer tone.It suited that violin . It is a well known fact that loading up a wood tailpiece with adjusters has a deadening effect on tone. Metal tailpieces seem an easy ,lazy way to go . So what does the material like ebony and rosewood do ? It picks up vibrations from the string and obviously begins to respond as a resonant wood always does.That will send some vibrations back to the bridge via all the strings connected to it. Then the bridge will amplify those extra vibrations. So that`s a better way to understand the word sizzle. I suppose you need a word to pin that down. Better to understand why it sizzles though .
I mentioned Violinist.com as the "experts" decided to rag on the writer asking the question. And I objected that it was bad to sneer at his question without testing it. What I said was "Be polite . --He`s a gentleman " The arrogant superiority struck me as a poor way to treat anyone .
What made ask these questions today ? Well even though my hearing has become so bad and in a few weeks I will have a cochlear implant I still wondered if I could play an instrument afterwards . Then I saw an advert for a Bandurria .This is a pear shaped instrument that began life in the 16th century. But it branched out to guitars ,mandolins etc. But this has an amazingly short scale--Eleven inches. By coincidence I had made a few skeleton fiddles and made the scale very short to suit my hand perfectly . Measuring the skeletons they had the same Eleven inch scale. Despite the modern use of a Bandurria with multiple 12 steel strings I thought it could be changed back to a nylon string instrument and converted to play with a violin tuning . If it works it will solve a problem lasting over seventy years.Something to suit my short fingers .
Then I wondered if the strings stretching down to the "bottom end" from the bridge would be better with a nice wooden tailpiece . Do you see where I`m going?
Or---String it up as a six nylon string guitar. Or one tuned with fifths all through .Endless possibilities . Perhaps a creative way to compensate for after -operation difficulties .