Any composites builders out there?

[TogaMan GViols]

OK I know that the overwhelming majority of Lutherie involves woodworking. I'm just seeing if there are any others on talk bass who have gone heretic (composites and mold making).

I have been ripping guitar as a part since I was a kid 50 years ago and I've been pretty active as a builder for the last quarter century. (One of your TB regulars Bruce Johnson knows me well and we've collaborated over the years since about 2003). I am best known for an unusual instrument called the TogaMan GuitarViol (guitar formatted viola) which is had a very strong cult following in the film and TV scoring industry of the last 24 years and the majority of them were typical woodworking. (I even got freakish about multi colored French polishing). About 430+ instruments and Bruce actually machined the parts on quite a number of them.

At some point I had hit frustration points with The terrible things that woods do. The initial foray into composites came after much frustration with the geometrically complex fingerboards (bruce's wonderful fret sliding machine was perfect for the job!) however consistency and increasing complexity of curve particularly on the bass side made a difficult job even more difficult as I optimized for the string tensions assigned to the instrument. I also tried CNC which actually became a labor multiplier (many man hours getting jewelry wire frets in and sanding to a polish - only to have climate whiplash - rain and drought - Southern California Santa Ana - shipping all over the world) at some point about 2014 I was beyond frustrated and begin R&D on a composite "ViolGlide" fingerboard; and Johnson was helpful in the initial guidance in mold making. The early molds were silicon which meant they were good enough for Proto types but not for repetitive production. The early examples took a lot of secondary hand work but the end product was amazing!
But the thought process came more from " regardless of tradition regardless of materials wood-biases be damned - what would the ultimate playing surface actually be like?" What came out of it was a one piece casted fingerboard with a nut and string lines already in place. No more putting 24 frets in - fighting physics and nature! This was about getting a precise repeatable result every time.

In those 2015 days I was just freshly moved in to The secret underground laboratory in Fillmore with Bruce across the hall. I went from initial silicon molds I had made before to Creating a legit composite mold (reverse engineered from one that Alastair Hay Emerald guitars Ireland had made off one of my plugs - that particular one did not work out but was an $$$ investment in education apparently). Anyway, transitioning from fine woodwork to composite part making is no joke! There is definitely a disconnect between people who make boats, drones, Ferraris and high-performance musical instruments. Thermoplastics engineers can't wrap their head around requirements of high impact sure hardness combined with high-performance lubricity. There may be some trade schools for guitar and violin making and separate ones for composites an industrial design. But there's a very big gulf between the two worlds! Perhaps as a age I might be attempting to bridge that gap a bit.

So the fingerboards have been a success and 100s of them have been made since 2016 - all of my instruments after basically. The actual performance benefits alone were worth it! But also having something that's not going to change Micro dimensions with seasonal shifts is a big deal (particularly if you have stuff it's shipped all over the world).

Eventually I got into building the entire instrument out of composites. Initially I shot for carbon fiber and absolutely hated it. It's light weight and residence we're not the problem; just a freaking nightmare to finish or repair. Eventually I drifted into other substrates like flax and hemp particularly. When treated right it can be a real super wood!

Of course I have found out the hard way just what the struggles were much like Ken Parker did with his Fly and perhaps modulus. It's not for everybody but for certain applications where you want nothing to move - I'm sure I can go on and on about this stuff! Composites have been around forever; just not in the way people think! Lutes are made of The nearest strips and linens soaked with hide glue. Same concept just different materials. Like high tech papier-mâché; instead of paper layered with water down wood glue/flour like piñata, you have cloth and epoxy of different grades Applied with skill.

Anyway I'm just wondering if there are any luthiers on talk bass who have applied composites to their builds? If so what drove that?

 

[Beej]

I've done a little experimenting, but I haven't put much into practice yet. I'm using more composite fretboards, but I'm mostly watching from the sidelines. A few builders here have done some in-depth composite builds here in the Luthier's Corner, but not many as far as I know. I'm curious what you're doing with flax and hemp!

 

[TogaMan GViols]

I've done a little experimenting, but I haven't put much into practice yet. I'm using more composite fretboards, but I'm mostly watching from the sidelines. A few builders here have done some in-depth composite builds here in the Luthier's Corner, but not many as far as I know. I'm curious what you're doing with flax and hemp!

Thanks! I wandered into Flax initially after struggles with carbon fiber - A nightmare to do any corrective finish work to. I had some imported Norafin flax nonwoven (about the feel of paper shop towels and tried it as an outer layer which created a friendly surface for finish AND some favorable improvements to the sound. The problem is most flax is imported and the quality stuff comes from Germany - even a free sample roll costed me 400 bucks to get in! This was in the middle of the pandemic and I started thinking about industrial hemp which is making a comeback after 80 some years of stigma. (turns out I like the frequency response even better with hemp!) Henry Ford used industrial hemp in 1941 to make lighter body panels on his cars - then reefer madness gave it the stigma. (William Randolph Hearst was in the paper in forestry products business and did not like the competition!) Hemp rope is ridiculously strong and has been used for centuries. I also realized that the farm bill of 2018 meant that hemp was available again on our continent. Even Alberta Canada is in on it! (nothing like supply chain hangups during a pandemic to really make you think about sourcing local) So I started messing around with 100% hemp cloth, raw fibers and even Micron powder. It works out and I've done really well it's like a super wood! Basically it's an alternative to fiberglass or carbon fiber that behaves more like wood because - it kind of is. See you can basically use the same kind of tooling approaches - just the substrate matrix is different.

I use hemp as a superwood for a lot of structural parts as well as The soundboard that I used to make out of Spruce. In this case it is a Balsa core with superior pine bass bar in a vacuum laminated molded sandwich - in some cases with an outer wood veneer. After making hundreds of spruce tops ranging from hand carved from a block, to pressure bent/partially carved (those were good!), The balsa core hemp tops as a soundboard are actually more powerful with a wide dynamic range! In fact I've been able to go a little more tension on the bass side then I used to dare with spruce (The tension of modern cello strings 6 - not 4) is no joke! Even my best glued bass bars on spruce wood rip away under pressure taking the wood with it if pushed too hard. These newer tops are not going anywhere and are more powerful (I even got a write up and composite world magazine back in November 2023).

Many people think of composites as fiberglass or carbon fiber. But really it's a whole realm of materials and possibilities! It's possible to use organic substrates and resins. What I do like about it is that you can do architectural things that would be impractical to do with wood. People see a block of wood a CNC machine and a ton of scrap on the floor (subtractive approach). Others see a mold pattern and hand applied materials with precision (additive approach). One approach leaves a lot of scrap. The other approach is very deliberate and repeatable.

Ironically my great uncle was a famous sailmaker to the J class in star class pre-World War II and abandoned hemp canvas of the day in favor of rayon/DuPont. Here I am circling back to Hemp as an instrument maker. Ha ha

The other benefit is it's a lot less nasty to work with Hemp (it's naturally anti-inflammatory) in contrast to working with fiberglass or carbon fiber. I've worked with a lot of woods and I'm particularly allergic to exotic Rosewood's etc. so working with industrial hemp (not exactly the tokable stuff) is very safe to work with! I thought it might be fun one day to make small ukulele molds and show kids how to lay it up with a relatively nontoxic resin or one of those sun UV cure types. Anyway, so much as possible!

J

 

[Passinwind]

Anyway I'm just wondering if there are any luthiers on talk bass who have applied composites to their builds? If so what drove that?

I'm not a luthier, but I have worked with several on the electronics design and fabrication end. In another life I did sailboard repairs and R&D work on composite battens and fins. I also took a class on hemp composite applications a couple of decades ago, and am happy to see that finally really starting to come to fruition. Welcome to TB, and I'm looking foward to hearing more about your work!

 

[TogaMan GViols]

I'm not a luthier, but I have worked with several on the electronics design and fabrication end. In another life I did sailboard repairs and R&D work on composite battens and fins. I also took a class on hemp composite applications a couple of decades ago, and am happy to see that finally really starting to come to fruition. Welcome to TB, and I'm looking foward to hearing more about your work!

Fantastic! I am no surfer but I am a fan of surfboard shaping as well as a lot of marine stuff. There's a part of me that wants to tinker with naval architecture and model making.

 

[Beej]

I just watched some youtube videos and had a good listen and that instrument is really cool Bruce has written about it before so I should have done a deep dive then but wow great tone

 

[TogaMan GViols]

I just watched some youtube videos and had a good listen and that instrument is really cool Bruce has written about it before so I should have done a deep dive then but wow great tone

Thanks! The YT channel goes back to before Google took it over. For the curious Home - GUITARVIOL: The Film Composer's Secret Weapon

And, Bruce was key to the early electric models 2003 on. Many iterations! I joined the secret underground laboratory back in 2015 and had a nice run with very talented other legendary luthier neighbors - good times! I spent evenings and weekends tooling up my current composites while delivering wood models by day. The composites project aka 10x design workstation with techs who would otherwise work at SpaceX sounded like a plan pre 2020 - now solo without the mini factory. Still building and exploring processes and materials!

Stay inspired!

 

[Bonkersville]

Interesting stuff. There's a Finnish company called Flaxwood that have been making composite electric guitars for 20+ years now. They use spruce (fir?) fiber and some kind of thermoplastic resin to make a material that can be injection molded.

I don't know if they have ever actually used flax or hemp in the manufacturing process, but I remember the body material had texture that reminded me of lumps of linen fiber strands pressed into form.

They have an English site at www.flaxwood.com, if someone's interested.

 

[Passinwind]

Fantastic! I am no surfer but I am a fan of surfboard shaping as well as a lot of marine stuff. There's a part of me that wants to tinker with naval architecture and model making.

Cool! The move to foiling in surfing, windsurfing, kiting, and especially the America's Cup has really bumped up the sophistication of composites engineering in those venues, all of which are fascinating to me. But taking it green and applying it to my even bigger passion is really sweet.

 

[Lo-E]

Have a look at some of @MPU 's builds. He's tinkered a lot with carbon fiber.

 

[UntitledProject]

I worked a lot with thermoplastics and composites making prosthetic limbs for people. It's a very different process than what most people are doing with them as everything is a one-off custom, but it's definitely given me an appreciation for what can be done with them.

 

[andvari7]

Unfortunately, there's one fewer person working in composites, with the very recent passing of Basslab founder/physicist Heiko Hoepfinger.

Interesting as the GViol is, do you build what can be considered traditional basses? I know Basslab's designs were anything but traditional, it has pickups, frets, and 4-6 strings (mine has 6), so it falls in that traditional style. Your story intrigues me, as a fan of composite instruments. Knowing a bit about the Trabant, I knew other composites were around, but I am not a materials scientist, so anytime I read about some new material or technique, it immediately piques my interest.

I'm not in the immediate market for a fretless 6-string bass, or a 32" scale fretted 4-string - I have debts to pay, and I need to try to buy a house - but, since Basslab's continued existence may be in doubt, and Aristides is dragging their feet on a headless bass, I would like more options.

 

[TogaMan GViols]

Interesting stuff. There's a Finnish company called Flaxwood that have been making composite electric guitars for 20+ years now. They use spruce (fir?) fiber and some kind of thermoplastic resin to make a material that can be injection molded.

I don't know if they have ever actually used flax or hemp in the manufacturing process, but I remember the body material had texture that reminded me of lumps of linen fiber strands pressed into form.

They have an English site at www.flaxwood.com, if someone's interested.

I remember them well at NAMM about 18 - so years ago.

 

[TogaMan GViols]

Unfortunately, there's one fewer person working in composites, with the very recent passing of Basslab founder/physicist Heiko Hoepfinger.

Interesting as the GViol is, do you build what can be considered traditional basses? I know Basslab's designs were anything but traditional, it has pickups, frets, and 4-6 strings (mine has 6), so it falls in that traditional style. Your story intrigues me, as a fan of composite instruments. Knowing a bit about the Trabant, I knew other composites were around, but I am not a materials scientist, so anytime I read about some new material or technique, it immediately piques my interest.

I'm not in the immediate market for a fretless 6-string bass, or a 32" scale fretted 4-string - I have debts to pay, and I need to try to buy a house - but, since Basslab's continued existence may be in doubt, and Aristides is dragging their feet on a headless bass, I would like more options.

My backlog has been ridiculous for over 20+ years. At my peak in the 2010s, I was managing three different model fleets: solid body electric, ElectroCoustic (Electric with acoustic behavior) and full blown bent side acoustics. Building normal traditional guitars and bases never fit into my priority bandwidth as the GuitarViol by itself kept me beyond busy. But he got to the point where massive woodworking was beginning to hurt (allergies) and maintaining relative humidity became as practical as sweeping the ocean off the beach with a broom (The job is never done - exhausting). Wood can do terrible things when it comes to precision and fragility. That is what interested me in creating a uni-model with aspects of all the other ones that were successful. So about the time I joined BRUCE Johnson and others at the secret underground laboratory in the Fillmore I was spending half my time building instruments to ship with a small crew of independent professionals and spending the other hours evenings and weekends going down the rabbit hole of composite work and making tooling. The idea back then (2015-2019) was to create a few technician jobs that would otherwise exist in places like SpaceX and Tesla. It seemed like a great idea until California went for Bolshevik and the pandemic hollowing out the majority of my film and TV customer base.

Anyway the irony is that I am operating from a tiny home space after shuttering my post Fillmore (Secret underground laboratory) space. All of this happened when I was in the middle of deep engineering and R&D mid pandemic working solo (thanks California) juggling chainsaws and herding cats and finding out the hard way that carbon fiber was not the material I wanted to stay with. Eventually I started experimenting with flax combinations and eventually looked too industrial hemp as the substrate of choice. I think it is incredible material that was unfairly stigmatized because if it's THC cousin, reefer madness (basically William Randolph Hearst was in the paper pulp forestry business and did not like competition). But prior to that in World War, rope and canvas were as strong as you can possibly get. I like its response as it acts like a "super-wood", is less nasty to work with compared to carbon fiber in fiberglass, and is naturally an anti-inflammatory which means my allergies don't go off as much. (BRUCE Johnson used to count my sneezes across the hall and Fillmore - ha ha).

But working with composites does he have some crazy learning curves. When innovating with a less common substrate like industrial hemp, there is a lot of R&D experimentation etc.. Through all the chaos of the pandemic era Valencia CA shop, I was just getting a hint of the progress and I'm still experimenting with various powders, hurds, and cloths.

The bottom line is those familiar with basic composite work in composite molds can't easily adapt. Same molds, similar process, just alternative materials. Since industrial hemp has been getting momentum again since the 2018 Farm bill, there's a lot of catching up and development to do with regard to application specific cloths like the
General carbon fiber and fiberglass industry has done so well. But I enjoy the pioneering part of it!

A bit of personal irony: my great uncle was a guy name Prescott Wilson who was an important sailmaker pre-World War II Rhode Island and New York. He designed the rig for the star class and also made the winning sales for the J class Americas cup. He was the first to use synthetic rayon Dupont for spinnakers and the couple from canvas and hemp. So we're here I am coming back full circle making heretical stringed instruments out of industrial hemp….

Anyway, I have no doubt that these approaches would make some seriously great basses and guitars as well. It's all in the engineering as Bruce Johnson would say.