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Joined:
May 2004
Posts: 295
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | While waiting (still!) for my Adamas to arrive, I've been thinking about the carbon fiber/wood soundboard construction. I don't know if this has ever been discussed in another thread, but I was wondering why a layer of wood is sandwiched between the carbon fiber layers. How much effect can the wood have on tonal properties if it is covered like that? Is there a reason the top can't be made of carbon fiber only? Prohibitively expensive?
When the mother ship was making Adamas prototypes, was one ever made without the wood in the soundboard? If so, did it not work for some reason? |
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Joined:
January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | You need something in the middle, otherwise it gets too thin. Solid carbonium would be too heavy. There was a guy who used cardboard. He sued Kaman and lost.
It relly is a balance of grafit for strength and wood for flex. |
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Joined:
May 2004
Posts: 295
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada | Thanks, cwk2. I gather from what you said that the wood affects tone because it allows the top to flex. Would that mean that using different woods could change the sound, because of the different "flex" properties of woods - i.e., would an Adamas with a layer of spruce sound different from one with birch? |
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Joined:
May 2003
Posts: 4389
Location: Capital District, NY, USA Minor Outlying Islands | Yes. Also, thickness of the wood layer makes a differnce. Of course, with the Adamas you're not trying to receate the sound of a spruce top classical, you're going for something different, more lively (amongst other things). |
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Why the wood?