Violin Forum/Message Board

[CT Dolan]

Please check out the link below:

http://www.thestrad.com/downloads/TSRoth.pdf

Has anyone ever tried this method, or thought of doing so? I had a similar idea some time ago, and have had the intention to give it a try when I get to this point, but I sometimes still wonder if there is a point... If so, what are the salient characteristics one should seek? Is density directly related to translucence, as suggested? This seems a great way to go, such a great guide, but I'm a way off from trying it myself, from knowing if it would be of any value. If any of you have experience, or an opinion, please chime in.

Thanks,
Chris

[Michael Darnton]

Quite a few people have tried it. I didn't like it because wood isn't uniformly colored, so the resulting grads didn't relate to anything, but I think some people do it.

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I see he goes for an even color. This could mean a lot of different things. The question I would have, though, is whether this assumed-preferable result is desirable or not?

[Tim McTigue]

I once read an article about a harpsichord maker who sought to learn the "secrets" of a particular maker of old. Sorry, I can't remember the name of either maker (I don't generally follow the harpsichord world to any extent), but the article stated that many of the most well-known harpsichord makers had tried to emulate the famous one, and had studied his harpsichords, but hadn't determined what it was that made them sound so much better. A curious detail was that his soundboards seemed to be rough-textured, and of arbitrary thickness, not smooth, and noone could figure out why. "Our hero" (the one about whom the article was written) decided that perhaps the seemingly-arbitrary differences in thickness had a purpose, and apparently figured out that it had to do with making the soundboard a uniform density, instead of thickness. He thicknessed his soundboards with a light behind, and basically scraped away where the annual rings were, so that the light shining through would be a uniform color. The article claimed that his harpsichords were world-renowned, and a very close approximation of the oringinal famous maker whom everyone sought to emulate. Anyway, that's what I remember of the substance of the article I read. Not sure if it's at all relevant to violin making, but it does show that this line of thought is not entirely out of left field...
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Tim
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[CT Dolan]

Michael, your statements reflect my concerns on the matter quite accurately, regarding potential pitfalls of following this method (the very reasons I wondered whether or not there was a point to the method in the first place).

Tim, very interesting article you mention, from which it would appear we are not alone with regard to violins, and our striving to replicate the past.

[Dave Chandler]

I also thought I had discovered a quick and easy way to graduate my plates, but found that it more reflected the density of the wood in different areas. Now that I've invested in a graduating caliper discovered that my earlier plates were not nearly as evenly graduated as I thought. The only real value I can see, is with spruce you can tell quickly if you're down to within 5mm or so, but from there, its best to measure. Probably the best single investment so far, has been my caliper.
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Dave in the Blue Ridge
Southern Violin Association

"Success is the ability to go from one failure to the next with no loss of enthusiasm" Winston Churchill

"I took the road less travelled, and now I don't know where I am." Marco Polo

[Michael Darnton]

But Dave, the real question is whether even graduations are desirable or not. The old guys didn't seem to think so.

This is a question I've been asking myself a lot lately, including the problem of whether they simply were doing what their technology allowed, or if they had some alternative strategy, like using light, for instance.

One thing that's certain, though is that the best violins don't have tops that are 2.5mm, + or - .05mm, but a lot of the not-best ones do. In fact one of the things I was trying to find out on the web yesterday was when the precision caliper of the type we use became available. I'm starting to think that when it came in was just about exactly when real quality went out. For instance, Vuillaume thought he would equal Stradivari by copying Stradivari, but one of the things he didn't copy was grads, because he had a "better" way of doing it precisely. His contemporaries Rocca and Pressenda are a lot more valuable now--but I don't think I have any grad charts of their instruments to compare. There are a number of similar instances, where I am thinking that precise grads have a specific result that I don't like, but I'm not certain yet what the alternative strategy would have been. . .

No answers on any of this at the moment, but I do have several experiments in that direction running, both on regrads and on my own violins.

[Janito]

If one accepts that many fine Cremonese have been regraduated in the epoc of precision instruments, and if they still sound superlative, where does this leave the imprecision of the original maker?

[Michael Darnton]

IF one accepts that. I don't, however, accept it wholesale. I think that if you have enough data (which I think I do) it's discoverable in many cases which have and have not been regraduated, reasonably accurately.

And it doesn't discount the value of the concept that varying grads are important if the regraduations haven't been + or - .05mm, no matter who did it. The bottom line, though, is that you hardly ever see an old Cremonese instrument which is, say, 2.5mm, exactly, all over its top.

[Janito]

Exceptions can sometimes prove a rule.

Do you have any information on graduations where there is bearclaw or knots or wild grain?

[Michael Darnton]

Perhaps, but I don't see enough exceptions to use for developing any rules.

The makers I have been interested in did not use that type of wood.

[actonern]

One additional thing I've noticed in the "light through the wood" is that it isn't just density that can affect light transmission. It's also common for the spruce to have differences in resin content in certain areas of the plate, and the more resinous wood is a lot more "transluscent," even if the density is the same or very similar.

[CT Dolan]

[Janito]

You don't have to go as far as archery.

There is a school of bowmaking that uses a wire between head and frog to ensure perfect wood movement as the tension is increased (see my comment in Bowmaking section of forum).

[violinarius]

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[violinarius]

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