Solid rib garland?

[polkat]

Somewhat recent talk here about one piece rib, back, and neck assemblies got me to thinking about a violin I had a number of years ago. This was an unlabled fiddle of moderately decent construction and nice varnish, but quite oddly, while it had normal top and back plates, the entire rib garland was constructed of a single piece of wood, roughly 3mm thick all the way around. It was obviously sawn out of a block of maple (maple if I remember correctly) by an amatuer, but one with great sawing skills! The top and bottom of the garland were carved out to accept standard willow type blocks. There were no corner blocks (hardly a need for any).

Surprizingly, while one might think this instrument would sound muted because of this, the violin had nice tone and projected well. I have never seen 'ribs' like this before or since. But...has anyone else?

[Lyndon Taylor]

Ive seen this construction on factory American violins, I think

they are Gibson, Kalamazoo, the sides are thinner than 3mm though,

the corner blocks are all included from the same wood, sincerely

lyndon J Taylor

[troutabout]

Jackson Guldan used that rib construction but with corners included in one piece on some of their models. I have one with that rib design cut from sycamore.

[geerten]

Hi,

as for the Gibson violins: I know that the first Gibson archtop

guitars (around 1900) also had sides from one solid piece. It could

well be that construction methods for guitars and violins back then

were the same at that factory, or that the construction for guitars

were modeled after the violin construction then used.

Geerten.

[Ken Pollard]

I ran across one of these a few years back. The ribs & all blocks were cut from a single piece of wood, though I believe the ribs were certainly thinner than 3 mm. It was an impressive piece of saw-work, as previously noted.

Taking the top off, I found it to be quite well-glued to the ribs. On section was particularly tough. I gave it a little muscle, the knife went through, caught a finger on the other hand, resulting in a nasty cut. A few stitches.

And I knew better, just got in a hurry.

It wasn't a particularly rich sounding instrument.

[Bob A]

The mandolins originally made by Orville Gibson embodied this approach; he also believed in hollowing the necks. I believe he went to a more standard means of construction by the time he sold his business to the group of investors that became the Gibson Company.

I don't think his early instruments were that well thought of, or particularly noteworthy so far as sound and playability were concerned.

[Ken Pollard]

Guess I should add that I was using a new seam knife as well, just arrived in the mail that day. It had a sharper edge than I previously used. I pretty much retired that knife for seam-opening.

And secondly, I usually don't keep one hand in front of the cutting edge. Just wanted to get the top off before the end of the day, and got stupid.

[Michael_Molnar]

Solid Rib Garland: Oh my! Sounds like the Masochists have routed the Luddites.

[polkat]

Thinking about it some more (it's been a while) I think the top and bottom blocks may have been intrigal to the ribs. As said, there were no corner blocks (no real room for them). The top and bottom edges of the ribs were 3mm as I said, but I seem to remember the inside of the ribs had been carved out a bit to thin the sides out by a mm or so. This was not sycamore, but appeared to be maple (had flaming as normal on the ribs). As said, the instrument had average craftmanship, but the tone was quite nice (in my opinion).

I guess what I'm asking is; it seems to me that this would actually be a more difficult approach to making a garland (percise sawing and such). Is there any worthwhile reason to experiment with making garlands this way?

[Bob A]

My take is that in addition to the problems of actually making the thing, the wastage of wood would run into big bucks, it would be way heavier than needed, and in fact considerably weaker than the usual construction methods. Tendency to warp would be high as well.

There's probably more good reasons why this is far from typical methodology. Someone with actual experience might chime in with them.

[Ken Pollard]

"Is there any worthwhile reason to experiment with making garlands this way?"

I second Bob's idea -- seems it would be a more difficult method, resulting in a weaker garland.

How did someone come up with this method and what was their motivation? Certainly they knew the parts of the garland (ribs, blocks, linings) -- and so were trying to imitate the form without the function?

[Michael Richwine]

Jackson Guldan made one-piece ribs with integral corner blocks. It's hard to imagine making one piece rib garlands without integral corner blocks. How else could one treat the corners without their being too fragile to use? The outer profile would be cut with a machine called a profiler or even with a shaper and template, and then the whole assembly could be bandsawed off, steamed or heated and bent to shape in a form.

[HongDa]

Somewhat recent talk here about one piece rib, back, and neck assemblies got me to thinking about a violin I had a number of years ago..... I have never seen 'ribs' like this before or since. But...has anyone else?

Is there another post about this? I recall someone posting some pictures before.

I found one in my shop a few days ago, a violin someone gave me and has just been hanging there a few years. I was going to fix it up for someone to learn on but decided to keep it as the ribs and neck set are interesting.

The accuracy of the rib work is impressive and even includes linings.

It has a bakelite chinrest with PAT. APP and a logo with Becker on the underside. Is it possibly a Becker factory instrument?

I'll post some pictures in a few days.