Well, that's different... (the Verso Sine guitar)

[glasshand]

https://www.wallpaper.com/tech/verso-mu ... -interview



I appreciate new thinking and people who are willing to do something other than ape past designs, but personally, this is not for me. Firstly, it looks like a piece of 1960s Danish furniture. On a more practical note, I think wooden pickup covers are a bad idea, as they'll wear quickly if you hit them with a pick, and the exposed wiring looks like it's begging to get snagged by something.

[tonebender]

I could not do that either.

[BatUtilityBelt]

I'll take none, thanks.

[andrewsrea]

Paging Timothy Leary... paging Timonthy Leary...

(That is one abstract take on a guitar!)

[Tonray's Ghost]

Well the knobs wouldn't seem to be in the best position for making on stage adjustments when you're doing you're best EVH imitation and another thing, with all that wood, you need to be careful where you put your lit cigarette

[mozz]

Well, i read the whole article. He's just trying to be different and taking a different approach. I'm sure somebody will demonstrate this to a good potential. Ugly as some may find it, i guess you would need a different approach to playing it.

[lonecrow]

If I had the money,I would love to own one of these. Then again i like odd instruments.
I appreciate a company that will try something new.

[glasshand]

I don't want to come across as too negative. We should remember that the solid body electric guitar met with a lot of resistance from traditionalists ("That's not what guitars look like!") and even the Stratocaster had its detractors ("The neck is attached with screws? That's not how proper guitars are made!"). I don't care for this one in particular, but I'd never want people to stop experimenting.

[sabasgr68]

As @glasshand said, I love to see experiments, even if they aren´t practical or nice to the eyes - like this one for me -.

And since we are on the subject - not meaning to derail OP thread -, what about this? I like the idea in general - would prefer other finishes AND block inlays, not dot inlays! -. Not sure about how practical or long-lasting it'll be, but interesting it is...

https://www.fernguitars.com/

[andrewsrea]

As @glasshand said, I love to see experiments, even if they aren´t practical or nice to the eyes - like this one for me -.

And since we are on the subject - not meaning to derail OP thread -, what about this? I like the idea in general - would prefer other finishes AND block inlays, not dot inlays! -. Not sure about how practical or long-lasting it'll be, but interesting it is...

https://www.fernguitars.com/


fernguitars.jpg


fernguitars1.jpg

Your post reminded me that I recently came across a design / drawing I made in the early 90's that I came across recently. It was a Strat-like guitar, where the pickups were mounted to a removable piece of wood and the controls were in the guitar body. The pickup platform plugged into the rear of the body and were held in with four nylon ball & sockets and the pots & wires were connected by brass contacts (like a knife switch makes contact). In theory, at a gig you could start a song with a Les Paul set up and change to P-90's, a Strat, a Tele or a Gretsch set up within 3 to 5 seconds and finish the song with a completely different sounding guitar.

[BatUtilityBelt]

https://www.fernguitars.com/

"The body is crafted from downed ash trees"

That's good news. I'd hate it if they were cutting into the trunks of trees they left standing.

Seriously though, I do appreciate R&D efforts bigly, and like @andrewsrea I have considered some of my own too. The one thing I like on the guitar in @glasshand 's OP, the pickups can easily change position on the strings. That was something I always wanted to implement - not move perpendicular to the strings, but move along the strings. It would let them focus on very specific parts of the waveforms generated in the string vibrations, and that can profoundly change their sound. Imagine moving toward or away from a particular harmonic for a specific piece of music. It was only the sheetmetal gadget I balked at as I see that as a gimick, because the poles move away at different rates, making the treble side change more than the bass side.

[andrewsrea]

...the pickups can easily change position on the strings. That was something I always wanted to implement - not move perpendicular to the strings, but move along the strings.

That is a cool concept. Pickups (whether by design or chance) are placed at intervals, just like frets.

For example, a Les Paul neck pick is under the same interval as the harmonic of the 5th fret on an open string, which means harmonic derivatives of the root note. In musician's speak, it is why Slash's intro to 'Sweet Child o Mine' is so harmonically rich. if the pickup were moved back from that spot, like in a 1961 SG Les Paul, it sounds flat. However, if you play the same notes a full step up, it sounds better.

I am not sure how to achieve a moving pickup system, without eliminating a lot of the mass between the bridge and neck. That would be a big trade off. The back-load design came up with, could have different modules which have different pickup spacings, again to compliment a song in a particular key.

[BatUtilityBelt]

I am not sure how to achieve a moving pickup system, without eliminating a lot of the mass between the bridge and neck. That would be a big trade off. The back-load design came up with, could have different modules which have different pickup spacings, again to compliment a song in a particular key.

It would be a big routed pool for sure, and I didn't want to limit the types of pickups. In my mind, I was seeing a rail mounted trolly of sorts. The trolly on rails would provide the adjustment, and a pickup would be mounted to the trolly. What kept me from experimenting toward it was the obviously visible gap left to accommodate movement. I thought it would be a bit Frankenstein unless one could see all the way through it, front-to-back.

[sabasgr68]

As @glasshand said, I love to see experiments, even if they aren´t practical or nice to the eyes - like this one for me -.

And since we are on the subject - not meaning to derail OP thread -, what about this? I like the idea in general - would prefer other finishes AND block inlays, not dot inlays! -. Not sure about how practical or long-lasting it'll be, but interesting it is...

https://www.fernguitars.com/


fernguitars.jpg


fernguitars1.jpg

Your post reminded me that I recently came across a design / drawing I made in the early 90's that I came across recently. It was a Strat-like guitar, where the pickups were mounted to a removable piece of wood and the controls were in the guitar body. The pickup platform plugged into the rear of the body and were held in with four nylon ball & sockets and the pots & wires were connected by brass contacts (like a knife switch makes contact). In theory, at a gig you could start a song with a Les Paul set up and change to P-90's, a Strat, a Tele or a Gretsch set up within 3 to 5 seconds and finish the song with a completely different sounding guitar.

It would be an interesting project to work on, Rob.

I've always been a fan of "swiss army knives" gadgets - understanding and accepting their inherent limitations, for example, the screwdriver in a swiss army knife is not as strong and practical as a proper screwdriver, but you can get some works done with it -. I've always liked the idea of a do-it-all guitar, and would really like to have one if there's such a guitar like that. I know, though, that most guitarists want/prefer the "proper" guitars, and I do understand that there are several factors that make guitars unique, so a one-guitar-for-all won't be really possible, but you get the idea. If I could have several pickup options for just one guitar body I'll be happy.

Anyway, interesting project. Now, 20ish years after you made that design, and with all your experience accumulated in those years, what do you think of your own idea?

[sabasgr68]

https://www.fernguitars.com/

"The body is crafted from downed ash trees"

That's good news. I'd hate it if they were cutting into the trunks of trees they left standing.

Seriously though, I do appreciate R&D efforts bigly, and like @andrewsrea I have considered some of my own too. The one thing I like on the guitar in @glasshand 's OP, the pickups can easily change position on the strings. That was something I always wanted to implement - not move perpendicular to the strings, but move along the strings. It would let them focus on very specific parts of the waveforms generated in the string vibrations, and that can profoundly change their sound. Imagine moving toward or away from a particular harmonic for a specific piece of music. It was only the sheetmetal gadget I balked at as I see that as a gimick, because the poles move away at different rates, making the treble side change more than the bass side.

Another interesting idea.

Wow, there are so many things I don't know about guitars; the many things that influence the sound that would finally come out.

After reading this, my idea of a do-it-all guitar makes no sense, there won't ever be such a guitar.

And perhaps that's a good thing, because we can have all the options out there, and just pick the ones we like.

[andrewsrea]

"I've always been a fan of "swiss army knives" gadgets..."

Now, 20ish years after you made that design, and with all your experience accumulated in those years, what do you think of your own idea?

My journey led me to prototyping 'Swiss army knife' music equipment and I have come to the personal conclusion that I prefer musical items which do a few things well and very reliable, versus those which do many things mediocrely and are less reliable, due to complexity.

As such, my 20-year-old design would not fit me, but may fit someone who gets bored and wants to change it up once in a while. I also feel if someone were to use it frequently as part of their stage show, as originally intended, its few critical mechanical parts would wear out in less than two years.

What kept me from moving forward on this and many other commercial ideas at the time they were conceived, was the hurdle those ideas had to overcome. The return for risks had to be much greater than my successful 35-year aerospace career.

Now that I am retired from my career, I have reevaluated some of those (some at the goading of @golem) and most have past the time that they would have been lucrative. For example, in the early 90's I saw two growing markets for hand-wired, robust amplifiers: very affordable made offshore and imported into the US and a US flagship boutique line (doctors and lawyers amps). No one was doing that and I had plenty of designs. Now the market for this is saturated and modelers are becoming popular, to which many industry insiders think this is the year that all but a few brands will close their doors.

[sabasgr68]

"I've always been a fan of "swiss army knives" gadgets..."

Now, 20ish years after you made that design, and with all your experience accumulated in those years, what do you think of your own idea?

My journey led me to prototyping 'Swiss army knife' music equipment and I have come to the personal conclusion that I prefer musical items which do a few things well and very reliable, versus those which do many things mediocrely and are less reliable, due to complexity.

As such, my 20-year-old design would not fit me, but may fit someone who gets bored and wants to change it up once in a while. I also feel if someone were to use it frequently as part of their stage show, as originally intended, its few critical mechanical parts would wear out in less than two years.

What kept me from moving forward on this and many other commercial ideas at the time they were conceived, was the hurdle those ideas had to overcome. The return for risks had to be much greater than my successful 35-year aerospace career.

Now that I am retired from my career, I have reevaluated some of those (some at the goading of @golem) and most have past the time that they would have been lucrative. For example, in the early 90's I saw two growing markets for hand-wired, robust amplifiers: very affordable made offshore and imported into the US and a US flagship boutique line (doctors and lawyers amps). No one was doing that and I had plenty of designs. Now the market for this is saturated and modelers are becoming popular, to which many industry insiders think this is the year that all but a few brands will close their doors.

Thanks, Rob!

Interesting and true.