Quote:
Originally Posted by Matthew Tucker
That's why I love basses so much  |
What does what? Who knows.. It is easy sometimes to gauge too much or too little in thickness and builds but which way to go to get the right stuff done is always interesting.
My Cornerless bass was/is ultra powerful and the back is a gradual taper with some gentle bend in the upper back, not an angle break cut. When I got it I glued up all the cracks that were open mainly from the outside just to keep it going till the restoration. It would shake itself apart and you could see daylight thru the F-holes coming from the back cracks. Other than fixing all that's loose and re-doing EVERY previous repair, we are leaving the bass alone. What's done was done and with old basses, over modifying is not always a good thing.
Why did that bass sound so good and so loud? A combination of things. How much of each we don't really know but it had the right stuff! It had its own internal can of whoop-ass!
The copy bass will have a gradual taper from block to block as well BUT a shallowish round back with a center brace. Three of my roundbacks currently have center braces as well. The Panormo School which is very old if not original, my Candi which was partially put in for a repair and to strengthen the softer maple used for the back and my Martini which is the same soft wood but thicker made in 3 piece. The partial brace in that is to protect the joint on the soundpost side. The two that were just done recently slightly improved the projection of the bass as far as speed of sound or it feels like it. The other is older than time but for a huge bass, not a bad idea.
Back designs, bracing systems, sizes of basses, the species or wood used and the thickness of the woods. All of these factor in.