Archtop Photo Thread

[Digits_Only]

Very nice John!

I wish someone would produce these, living in the desert is hell on wood guitars (and a real PIA for their owners!).

[J.R. Rogers]

Wow - those Carbon Fiber archtops are beautiful, John. Did you build those?

JR

[John Morciglio]

THANKS,

and yes. Have close to 50 under my belt since starting back up in late 2010.

Mostly carbon, (all wood builds incorporate carbon tops, structure or accents)

ALL archtops (accept 1 player/beater bass).

JM

[louparte]

I just bought one of these.



I already own a big jazzbox.

[zombywoof]

1953 Epiphone Triumph Regent. Just finished putting it all back together. While I do not normally name guitars, a friend of mine bestowed the moniker "Bloody Mary" on it for obvious reasons.

[Hot Vibrato]

Originally Posted by zombywoof

1953 Epiphone Triumph Regent. Just finished putting it all back together. While I do not normally name guitars, a friend of mine bestowed the moniker "Bloody Mary" on it for obvious reasons.

Interesting... This seems to be an epidemic among NY Epiphones from that era. I think the pickguards literally melt over time, leaving a nasty mess on the guitar top. The Triumph is beautiful anyway! I recently bought this "fixer-upper" from a guy on Craigslist. It's a '53 Zenith:

[IMG][/IMG]

I tried sanding through the mess, but it has badly stained the top, so I stopped sanding. I'll do my best to perform an artistic touchup, using qualisole and fresco powder, an airbrush, and a graining brush, It's either that or it becomes a black guitar. Since vintage value is lost and it was just an entry-level archtop with plywood back and sides to begin with, I'm considering adding a florentine cutaway when I do the restoration.

I also have a '53 Zephyr Regent. When I bought it about 15 years ago, the pickguard was kind of warped. I stuck it in a drawer, but last time I looked it was really curled up, and coated with an oily film. I'll try to dig it out and post a pic of it if I can find it. It might just be a puddle at the bottom of the drawer by now.

P.S. What work did you have to do on the Triumph?

[zombywoof]

Originally Posted by Hot Vibrato

Interesting... This seems to be an epidemic among NY Epiphones from that era. I think the pickguards literally melt over time, leaving a nasty mess on the guitar top. The Triumph is beautiful anyway! I recently bought this "fixer-upper" from a guy on Craigslist. It's a '53 Zenith:

I tried sanding through the mess, but it has badly stained the top, so I stopped sanding. I'll do my best to perform an artistic touchup, using qualisole and fresco powder, an airbrush, and a graining brush, It's either that or it becomes a black guitar. Since vintage value is lost and it was just an entry-level archtop with plywood back and sides to begin with, I'm considering adding a florentine cutaway when I do the restoration.

I also have a '53 Zephyr Regent. When I bought it about 15 years ago, the pickguard was kind of warped. I stuck it in a drawer, but last time I looked it was really curled up, and coated with an oily film. I'll try to dig it out and post a pic of it if I can find it. It might just be a puddle at the bottom of the drawer by now.

P.S. What work did you have to do on the Triumph?

Yeah, the culprit was the pickguard. I also have what is left of it stashed in a drawer. If I remember I will snap a pic of it. I would also add shrunken binding as a chronic ailment of 1950s Epiphones. I have a 1956 FT-79 which was suffering from that one. I am probably just going to leave the body as is rather than try and sand and touch up the finish. Eventually I wll replace the pickguard.

I did not have to do a lot of work to do on the Triumph. Mostly some gluing and dealing with the binding which flew off the guitar after I snipped where it had popped up. The guitar had been stripped of all its parts when I found it. I was initially planning to slap whatever parts I could gather up on it but then went and made an offer on the original tuners, tailpiece, bridge, and case. I got them all at a nice price but still ended up paying more for the parts than the body.

[Hot Vibrato]

Originally Posted by zombywoof

Yeah, the culprit was the pickguard. I also have what is left of it stashed in a drawer. If I remember I will snap a pic of it. I would also add shrunken binding as a chronic ailment of 1950s Epiphones

I have a '41 blonde Spartan that also has that problem with some of the binding. The neck binding and back binding are still perfect. The top binding and some of the headstock binding have deteriorated to the consistency of dried clay. A huge section of the top had been shattered and was literally in pieces. I carefully reconstructed the top (which was quite an undertaking), and did a plane and refret. I strung it up and played it for several years without fixing the binding, but eventually it needed a neck reset. I've steamed the neck out and am working on the top binding replacement, although the project unfortunately has taken a back burner. I'll probably try to finish that project before I even start on the Zenith. The Spartan sounded beautiful for the time it was playing well. The pickguard from that one is sort of tiger striped, and it's still in tact and perfectly straight.

Originally Posted by zombywoof

I did not have to do a lot of work to do on the Triumph. Mostly some gluing and dealing with the binding which flew off the guitar after I snipped where it had popped up. The guitar had been stripped of all its parts when I found it. I was initially planning to slap whatever parts I could gather up on it but then went and made an offer on the original tuners, tailpiece, bridge, and case. I got them all at a nice price but still ended up paying more for the parts than the body.

If yours is like mine, the stain goes well into the wood. It may be best to leave it as it is, but I'm already committed since I've sanded to bare wood on the Zenith (wish me luck...).

My '53 Zephyr Regent is the same size and shape as your Triumph, but it's a somewhat different beast since it has a laminated maple top, back, and sides (and it's sunburst), with a "New York" pickup mounted to the top. The pickup has a cool midrangey tone which is kind of lo-fi sounding. That guitar could use a refret, the body binding replaced, and it's bordering on needing a neck reset, but it's still playable. I'll hold off on this project also until after I finish up with the Spartan. See the following post for a pic of the Zephyr Regent.

[Hot Vibrato]

A band I used to play in thought it would be cool to pose our instruments for a promo pic. The Gibson on the left is a '57 (I think) ES-175, and the guitar on the right is my '53 Epiphone Zephyr Regent:

[IMG][/IMG]

[MC5C]

The pictures of Epiphones make me want to try again to learn how to post pictures here... So here goes nothing, probably!

Epiphone Zephyr, probably either 1942 or 1946 as they stopped production during the war years, and the serial number starts with 25. Pickup location indicates an early 1940's Zephyr, anyway. 5 ply spruce laminated top, with no braces at all inside. Laminated back and sides also, with no back access port the way earlier models had. The Mastervoicer tone control is straight through at the mid-way setting, and cuts highs and lows as you turn it to "mellow" or "brilliant". Original tailpiece but has been broken and repaired at the sharp bend. Nice guitar, original frets are quite low now but very slim Vee neck plays as fast as a modern instrument. Neck was reset last year.

[MC5C]

Here are the two archtop guitars that I've made. This one was really my first guitar, made in 2015, but I call it number two because I made a tele copy out of plywood and an old Tiesco Del Ray teardrop Vox copy when I was 16, 42 years ago now.

This one is called "Firewood Guitar", because all of the curly maple trim is from logs I took out of my firewood pile. I burned about 4 tons of curly maple that winter, and grabbed a few to resaw and see what I could do with it.



This is an experimental guitar. The top is from western red cedar that I bought long ago as a piece of decking from Home Depot. Perfectly quarter sawn, about 6" wide after trimming, and the top is four pieces wide. Fully carved per the Benedetto formula, and X braced. Neck is mahogany with a birdseye maple fretboard. The back is 2" thick solid mahogany with a 1" strip of maple added for strength, and fully chambered out so that there is a 1/2" rim and 1/2" thick back. So it's a completely hollow solid body with a carved arched top. The pickup is a neck mounted Johnny Smith type, full sized humbucker. Volume control on the curly maple finger rest. The idea was to get all of the sustain and tone of a solid body instrument, with the tone fully informed by the carved top. It worked great, it is a fantastic sounding jazz guitar with a lot of sustain and sensitivity. It's a bit heavy, though.

[iim7V7IM7]

My two 16" mahogany/carpathian spruce and maple/carpathian spruce archtops by luthier Bill Comins...

[MC5C]

This my next guitar, a fully carved acoustic archtop named Catharine that I finished in 2016. It is flamed redwood over mahogany back and sides, with a triple X brace. I wanted the bracing to be light, but was a bit scared by the advice I was getting that the curly redwood would not be very strong, so I added a center brace right up the middle of a normal X brace. Fretboard and headstock I ordered from England's Custom Inlay. Neck is three piece curly and birdseye maple, bolt-on joint. Finish is sprayed acrylic lacquer and the burst I call a "sunrise burst", was hand rubbed with red, brown and yellow alcohol based dye. It turned out well, has a very clear and transparent, kind of shimmery tone with a lot of volume and headroom. It's by far the loudest acoustic I have, it's as loud as my resonators.

I am currently designing and starting to build a unique (I hope) nylon stringed archtop, Adirondack spruce over spanish cedar back and flamed maple sides. I am putting a lot of thought into how to make an extremely light and responsive body that retains a lot of strength and stability, to make the nylon strings work well.





This pic is part way through the finishing process, before final gloss coats or polishing.

[zombywoof]

[QUOTE=Hot Vibrato;5016919]
If yours is like mine, the stain goes well into the wood. It may be best to leave it as it is, but I'm already committed since I've sanded to bare wood on the Zenith (wish me luck...).

[QUOTE]

Yup. I took it down to the top wood in one area and decided not to go any further. The goop on the top does not affect the sound and if nothing else gives the guitar a bit of individuality.

[zombywoof]

Here is another one - a mid-1930s Kay Kraft Deluxe (the badge they used in between Kay Kraft and Kay). Sexy Oahu headstock. This is one of the last guitars to have the Zorzi adjustable neck which still works like a dream.