GB2156134A

GB2156134A - Improved electric guitar

Info

Publication number: GB2156134A
Application number: GB08402837A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Andrew Bond
Original assignee: BOND GUITARS Ltd
Current assignee: BOND GUITARS Ltd
Priority date: 1984-02-02
Filing date: 1984-02-02
Publication date: 1985-10-02
Also published as: GB8402837D0

Abstract

An electric guitar has a body portion, a neck and a head stock comprised of a structural foam plastics material (27) integrally moulded about a reinforcing member (25) of fibre reinforced plastics material, said reinforcing member extending into said head stock and said body portion for at least the full length of the strings to provide a rigid beam support for said strings. A recess is provided in the part (31) of the reinforcing member in said body portion and pick-ups (41, 42, 43) are provided in said recess to sense vibration of the strings through at least one aperture in the front (15) of the guitar body portion, said pick-ups and electric circuitry being provided on the inner surface of a removable back panel (36) of the guitar body portion. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Improved electric guitar This invention relates to an electric guitar and more especially to a guitar having an improved construction such that it is stiffer than previous guitars in order to provide an improved performance.

Whereas it has been previously proposed in United States Patent Specification No 4084476 to provide a rigid and stiffened elongated neck to a guitar, in this prior construction there has been no appreciation of the need to construct not merely the neck, but also the headstock and at least part of the body of the guitar so as to provide a rigid beam extending for at least the full length of the strings without there being any movement possible to the head stock and/or the body of the guitar relative to a separately formed and attached neck.

According to the present invention there is provided an electric guitar having a body portion, a neck and a head stock comprising a structural foam plastics material integrally moulded about a reinforcing member of fibre reinforced plastics material, said reinforcing member extending into said head stock and said body portion for at least the full length of the strings to provide a rigid beam support for said strings, a recess being provided in the part of the reinforcing member in said body portion, pick-ups being provided in said recess to sense vibration of the strings through at least one aperture in the front of the guitar body portion.

With this construction it has been found possible to overcome the problem of the beam comprising the guitar absorbing energy as it would do were the natural period to be within the frequency range of the guitar and as occurs with conventional guitars. With the construction of the present invention, the stiffness of the support for the strings can be increased twenty to forty times that of a conventional guitar, this providing an enormous shift of resonant frequency to the megacycle range well above the operating frequency of the guitar.

Preferably the reinforcing member comprises a frame part in the body portion of the guitar defining the peripheral walls of the recess. The recess can then be at least partly closed in front of the guitar by the structural foam plastics material and acts as a housing about the pick-ups while permitting ready access to the strings for the pick-ups through the apertured front of the guitar body portion.

Preferably also the rear of the rear of the recess is closed by a detachable member of the foamed structural plastics material. As a convenience, the pick-ups and the general electrical and electronic components may be carried by this detachable member for ready insertion into the recess in the guitar body.

The various tone and volume and pickup controls may themselves be accessible through apertures in the front of the guitar body. The bridge of the guitar body to which the strings are connected can be directly secured to the reinforcing member through the front of the guitar and preferably a rigid fingerboard is attached to the face of the reinforcing member at spaced portions along the neck of the guitar. This fingerboard, although it may be provided with conventional frets, preferably is in the form of a pitchboard as described in British Patent Specification No 1 511 840.

The invention will be further described, by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure 1 is a top view of a guitar embodying the invention; Figure 2 is a side view of the guitar of Fig.

1 with the strings removed; Figure 3 is an end view of the guitar; Figure 4 is a longitudinal section of the body of the guitar with the working parts removed; Figure 5 is a cross-section of the body of the guitar of Fig. 4; Figure 6 is a fragmentary rear view of the body of the guitar with the back panel removed; and Figure 7 is a cross-sectional sketch showing a detail of the construction of the neck of the guitar.

Referring to the drawings, Fig. 1 shows a guitar having a neck 1, a headstock 3 and a body 5. The headstock is provided with the usual fitments including knobs 7 for controlling rotation of tuning pegs 9. The neck 1 has mounted thereon a pitch board 11 provided with ridges 1 2 against which the strings can be stopped during playing although this pitchboard can be replaced by a conventional fretboard if so desired.

The guitar is formed from a beam 25 of fibre reinforced plastics material about which has been moulded a structural foam material 27 which also comprises the front 1 5 of the body of the guitar as illustrated in Figs. 4 and 5. Suitably the beam 25 may be formed of boron fibre or multidirectional carbon fibre in a standard resin matrix which may, for example, be of an epoxy or a polyester resin.

The structural foam material can conveniently be a structural urethane foam.

As may be appreciated from Figs. 4 and 6, the beam 25 extends into the headstock portion of the guitar and is formed at the other end with a frame part comprised of two spaced bifurcations 30 defining a recess therebetween with the remote ends of the bifurcations being connected by a portion 31 integral with the remainder of the beam.

The face 1 5 of the body 5 of the guitar is provided as shown in Fig. 1, with apertures 16, 17 and 18 for the receipt of pick ups for sensing movement of the strings and also, as clear from Fig. 1, further apertures are provided for the receipt, from below, of a binnacle 23 and switches 50 to 57. These latter apertures, for the purposes of simplification of the showing, are not illustrated in Fig. 6. The rear of the body 1 5 is closed by a removable panel 356 as shown in Fig. 4 also moulded from structural foam material similar to that of the material 27 used to cover the fibre reinforced beam.The ridge 21 is directly secured through the structural foam to the portion 31 so that the rigid beam structure 25 extends for the full length of the strings from the bridge to the headstock with the pegs 9 being directly supported by the beam.

Fig. 7 illustrates the preferred manner of fixing the pitch board 11 to the neck of the guitar. In Fig. 7 there is illustrated one screw 35 which passes through the pitchboard 11 and is screwed into the beam 25 to secure the pitchboard thereto. A plurality of such screws will be provided centrally along the lengths of the pitchboard and conveniently the tops of the screws 35 can be recessed below the level of the surface of the pitchboard 11 with the space so left being provided with a filler 36 which can be used as a scale marker. Normally twelve scale markers are provided along the length of the pitchboard. With this structure, when the strings are tightened, the pitchboard 11 will be under compression to assist the beam 25 in providing additional stiffening of the neck portion of the guitar.

In Fig. 4 pick-ups 41, 42 and 43 and further electronic circuitry 45 are shown mounted on the inner surface of the rear panel 36. As shown, when the rear panel 36 is secured in its required position to the rear of the guitar body, the top ends of the pickups project through the apertures 16, 1 7 and 1 8 into sufficiently close proximity to the guitar strings as to be able to pick up the vibrations thereof. As shown the recess for the receipt of the pickups is thus peripherally defined by the walls 30 and 31 of the beam 25 while an additional recess is provided within the body 5 of the guitar for receipt of other electronic equipment as indicated at 45.

With this arrangement there is a convenience that simply by removing the back panel 36 all the electronic circuitry is removed from the main body of the guitar for access for servicing or other purposes.

Reverting to Fig. 1 the performance of the guitar is controlled by the switches 50 to 57.

The switches 53, 55 and 57 are respectively touch sensitive switches which control whether or not the respective rhythm pick-up 41, mid pick-up 42 and lead pick-up 43 are on or off. The switches 54 and 56 are further touch sensors which control the phase relationships respectively between the mid pickup and the rhythm pick-up and between the lead pick-up and the mid-pick up. Thus, by utilisation of the phase switches it can be arranged whether the different coil windings are operating together in parallel or in series or whether they are operating 180 out of phase.

The switches 50, 51 and 52 are ramp switches which are tiltable by pressure at one end or the other from a normal level position so as to reduce or increase, as required, the volume, or the bass or treble equalisation.

Thus, as illustrated, switch 52 controls the volume of the output from the guitar whereas switch 51 controls treble equalisation and switch 50 the bass equalisation.

Different coloured LED displays in the binnacle 23 provide a visual indication of the particular values of the volume and treble and bass equaiíation as controlled by the ramp switches and also provide an indication of which of the switches 53 to 57 are on or off.

Instead of the use of single coil pick-ups as illustrated in Fig. 4, two coil pick-ups may be used. These, known as "hum bashing" pickups, comprise two coils which are out of phase relative to one another in order to cancel out hum.

With the structure as above described there is provided a guitar which is of an extremely rigid structure having an integral beam whereby the natural resonant frequency of the guitar is raised well above that of the strings, whereby there is very little damping of the string movement during playing. Furthermore, this integral very rigid construction has been so incorporated into the guitar that there is no interference with the proper location of the pick-ups and yet there is adequate space for the receipt within the guitar of the electronic circuitry required. The guitar itself is provided with a good feel by the structural foam outer surface, the electronic circuitry itself being readily available for access by being mounted on a detachable back panel.

Claims

1. An electric guitar having a body portion, a neck and a head stock comprising a structural foam plastics material integrally moulded about a reinforcing member of fibre reinforced plastics material, said reinforcing member extending into said head stock and said body portion for at least the full length of the strings to provide a rigid beam support for said strings, a recess being provided in the part of the reinforcing member in said body portion, pick-ups being provided in said recess to sense vibration of the strings through at least one aperture in the front of the guitar body portion.

2. An electric guitar according to claim 1, wherein the reinforcing member comprises a frame portion in the body portion of the guitar defining the peripheral walls of said recess.

3. An electric guitar according to claim 2, wherein the recess is at least partly closed at the front of the guitar by said structural foam plastics material.

4. An electric guitar according to claim 2 or 3, wherein the rear of the recess is closed by a detachable member of the foam structural plastics material.

5. An electric guitar according to claim 4, wherein the elctric and electronic components of the guitar are mounted on said detachable member.

6. An electric guitar according to claim 5, wherein parts of the electric and electronic components are received with a recess within the structural foam material exteriorly of said frame portion of the reinforcing member.

7. An electric guitar according to claim 6, wherein said parts comprise tone and volume and pick-up controls accessible through apertures in the face of the guitar body.

8. An electric guitar according to claim 7, wherein an indicator showing the state of the controls also is visible from the front of the guitar.

9. An electric guitar according to any preceding claim, wherein the bridge of the guitar to which the strings are connected is directly secured to said reinforcing member.

1 0. An electric guitar according to any preceding claim, wherein the string tightening pegs of the guitar are received in holes in the portion of the reinforcing member in the head stock.

11. An electric guitar according to any preceding claim, wherein a rigid fingerboard is attached to the face of the reinforcing member at spaced positions along the neck of the guitar.

1 2. An electric guitar according to claim 11, wherein the fingerboard is a pitchboard.

1 3. An electric guitar constructed and arranged substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to and as illustrated in the accompanying drawings.