side thickness

[Paul C]

What do most of you fellas thickness your sides to. And do you change it for different types of wood.

[Dave Bagwill]

I was just reading a post from Tim McNight :


"I can't speak about the thickness on your Guild but I know Martins and Gibsons nearly doubled the thickness of their sides and backs in the 1960's to cover their warranty claims. They still hold to this (heavier is better)philosophy today (for warranty purposes).

If you weigh a pre-war Martin or Gibson you will immediately notice these instruments are much lighter. I have repaired many and it is not uncommon to see sides in the .055" - .070" thickness range and backs were just a skosh thicker. Now they are using sides that are in the .090" range and backs that are around .090"-.100+".

Heavier backs tend to be passive and reflect the sound while thinner backs will be active and slingshot the sound energy. Imagine throwing a tennis ball (this would be the sound energy produced by the top) against a brick wall and measure the distance and speed it comes off the wall. Now imagine throwing a tennis ball at a trampoline. Which one will repel the ball at a higher velocity and at a greater distance? It's a no brainer...

I have built guitars both ways and now I only only build em light ;)"

[ken cierp]

.075" - .080" cutaway bends a tad thinner --- same as Martin. After sanding backs are .095 +/- .005" I feel the pain of those trying to assmeble one of those EBay kits where the backs (which were rejected) are still .125" or more!

[Kevin in California]

I have taken mine all down to between .080 and .085" on all the woods I've bent, some by hand and some in my bender machine. This has worked out fine on walnut, cocobolo, macacuaba, palo escrito, santos mahogany, and EIR for me.

Kevin

[Tim Benware]

I took the sides on my first 10 down to .080 to .085 and backs to .100. My current 2 will have sides .070-.075 and backs .080-.085. I'll see how it turns out.

[Paul C]

Thanks for the response guys. And Dave I use to play alot of tennis. And they always said stringing your racket lower in poundage would give you more power because of the trampoline effect. So if you were to build a more flexible back in addition to being thin would it be even more responsive. The guitar I am building now has a cedar back so I will find out eventually.