2010, Year of the Tiger, and it is time for a new Guitar Gallery. But first I say thank you to the builders who were the first to use the bridge after Schaller launched it in August 2008.
And thank you Schaller!
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| BLACKMACHINE GUITAR |
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Doug Cambell is the builder of Blackmachine guitars based in London. This superstrat B2 model has a mahogany neck and body with an amazing koa top and a Brazilian rosewood fretboard. It has a striking headstock design and a very unusual body thickness, 1.10" instead of the common 1.75".
The guitar was built for Misha Mansoor, founder and lead guitarist of the band Periphery.
For more info about this mean, sleek tiger, click on the picture, or go to the Testimonials page to read what Misha, aka Bulb, says about the guitar in a May 2010 interview.
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| DELTA GUITARS, JULIET 2010 MODEL |
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Another great looking and very well done guitar. Delta Guitars, www.delta-guitars.de, from Germany put the bridge on their new Juliet WM 2010 model. Bolt on neck with 22 medium jumbo frets and a combo of Seymour Duncan vintage mini and P90 stack humbuckers (push/pull to split the P90). The body is swamp ash and the neck is maple.
Finally a guitar with a new pickguard. And what a pickguard it is! Made out of figured wood, it is attached from the bottom of the guitar.
You have to admire the dedication to guitar design and building that drives so many great guitar builders.
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| TC ELLIS MANTIS 2 |
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| TC Ellis, www.tcellisguitars.com, is a builder out of Cardiff, Wales, and he offers high quality instruments at an affordable price. He has done a few guitars with the bridge, such as this Mantis 2 model. It has a mahogany body and neck with a flame maple top, faux binding and EMG Zakk Wylde humbuckers.
Click on the picture for more views.
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| IGOR KELLER GUITAR |
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This is an Igor Keller guitar, www.archtopguitars.sk, made for Marek Bino. It has a mahogany body, walnut top, rosewood/ebony laminate neck and SH4 and SH2 Seymour Duncan pickups, three way switch with just a volume knob.
Marek is from Slovakia. He runs the Music Report, an online music magazine, www.musicreport.sk. He asked me to do an interview which you can access by clicking on the picture.
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| RAM VECTIS MODEL |
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RAM Guitars are based outside of Chicago, www.ramguitars.com and Ron Mielzynski builds guitars by relying on classic inspired shapes and original designs with a modern edge.
This guitar is one of his new Vectis SC model. It has a mahogany body and set neck with a maple burl top, rio rosewood board, wood binding, a 25" scale and Wolftone pickups.
Ron was first classically trained as a violin maker and his attention to detail is truly amazing. You can see for yourself on his web site.
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| LINDSAY WILSON GUITAR |
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This beauty is from Lindsay Wilson Guitars, www.lindsaywilsonguitars.co.uk, and Howard Robinson is the builder based out of North Devon, England. He uses Bareknuckle pickups which are also made in Devon. The guitar body is made out of reclaimed English elm, bleached and limed and then finished with a matte nitro coating. Everything about this guitar is amazing. Great body shape and carving done by an expert wood worker and designer. The neck is maple and the fingerboard has a 9.5" to 12.5" compound fingerboard instead of the more common 10" to 14" shape.
By clicking on the picture you will see more pictures of this guitar as well as pictures of a mahogany model with humbuckers. There is also a great interview with Howard.
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| RON KIRN T-STYLE |
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Ron Kirn, www.ronkirn.com, is at it again. This swamp ash solid body T-Style has Jason Lollar pickups and an aluminum "vintage" plate supporting the bridge. Thomas Amberger was the first to use such custom plates when he built two Hannes Bridge guitars for Schaller. It makes the bridge look like it was meant to be used with this style of guitar.
Thanks Ron and Thomas!
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| CJ FEARN & CO |
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| Cabell Fearn has done a couple of models with the Hannes Bridge. This T-Style one has a semi-hollow honeycomb pearwood body with a bookmatched spalted maple top. The top has metal inlays made out of tin! The neck is wenge with a square steel tube bonded into it and it has an ebony fingerboard. The pickups are LeoSounds ViPlayer Tele 57.
Cabell also made the knobs out of wenge with an aluminum core. The top of the knobs have aluminum inlays of numbers from 1 to 11. He even made the jack mount out of ebony which was threaded for the output jack. That's all very impressive and for more information you can access the Cabell Fearn and Co. web site by clicking on the picture.
And here's a couple of video clips of Jens Kouros playing some original compositions:
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| CLICK FOR VIDEO 1 |
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| CLICK FOR VIDEO 2 |
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| HUFSCHMID GUITAR |
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Patrick Hufschmid, www.hufschmidguitars.com, Switzerland, has used the bridge extensively on some of his recognized Superstrats. He is a very innovative builder who uses his own original methods to build and finish an instrument. He has even designed his own pickups!
For more info, go to his web site where you'll be able to access videos and interviews. Don't miss it!
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| JARRETT VIKING |
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This just in from the recent 2010 NAMM Nashville Show. A Jarrett Guitars prototype Viking model. It has a crotch walnut top with a hollow black limba body and a rosewood neck and fingerboard. It also uses a THD Quintet Switch so that you can create all sorts of music from Jazz to Metal. The Jarrett Guitars company has always been open to innovations and has always tried to lead. Thank you!
How did it do at the show?
"Amazing guitar and was the hit of NAMM. It sounds incredible. Would have to say this is the best guitar to come out of our shop!"
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| RED ROCKET REDWOOD |
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| RED ROCKET REDWOOD |
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Matt Nowicki of Red Rocket Guitars, www.redrocketguitars.com, has done a few T-Style models. Two thumbs up for this redwood beauty: AAAAA flame redwood top over a chambered mahogany body and a solid cocobolo oiled neck with maple skunk stripe, stainless steel frets and a compound 10" to 16" radius. The neck is mounted with machine bolts which are screwed into threaded inserts for optimum neck to body contact. Pickups are Lindy Fralin P-90's, probably the nicest P-90's out there. The back and sides of the body have a copper/gold metalic finish with retro maple/chekered purfling binding, and a "retro space pulp neckplate". The back of the guitar looks great too!
Matt also did a great wenge model which you can see on his web site. He praises the bridge as "a high tech tone machine with amazing tone transfer".
Thanks Matt!
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| RETRO FRET GUITAR |
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| This is Retrofret Guitars' first production model and it is unique in many ways. The quartersawn mahogany body is 1/4" thicker than usual. The finish on the mahogany back with figured maple top is nitro lacquer. It only uses a single Seymour Duncan P-Rail pickup, but it has a three way switch which allows you to choose between a P90 soapbar sound, a blade single coil sound or a full bodied humbucker sound. There's more info about the guitar on the Retrofret Guitars web site.
Then of course there is the fretboard where none of the frets are straight! This fretting layout has been around for quite a while and it's called the Formula 1. It's a design from True Temperament AB out of Sweden and true temperament means that each note at every fret is right on pitch. If you think it's crazy then there are lots of crazy, well known guitar players who use it, like Steve Vai, John McLaughlin, etc...
The quest for the Holy Grail of guitar sound will never stop!
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| FORMULA 1 FRETS |
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I've been waiting for that axe from Texas and here it is. This black limba T-Style beauty is from Franklin Cash Guitars out of Fort Worth. The body and the neck, finished with Tru Oil, were made out of the same piece of wood. The body needed very little routing. A true solid body guitar! The neck has a 24.75" scale macassar ebony fretboard and the lone pickup is a tapped Vintage Vibe P-90 with a push/pull volume knob. It is fitted with the Buzz Feiten system and the logo at the headstock was done Texas style with a branding iron. It doesn't get any simpler than that, and the result is a stunning guitar with an amazing sound.
Franklin Cash Guitars is a partnership of Travis Franklin and Kerry Cash and they like the bridge a lot, calling it a super bridge. If you're looking to get yourself a super guitar...give them a call.
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| DAEMONESS PINK INTRUDER |
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Dylan Humphries is the amazing builder behind Daemoness Guitars based out of Bristol, England. He is dedicated to building the finest Metal guitars and he did this one for Nolly, lead guitarist of Red Seas Fire. You can go to this LINK to access the Metal Guitarist forum for more details, but here is what Nolly says about the bridge: I love the Schaller Hannes bridge to bits, I've wanted a guitar with one for a long time so it's amazing to have one now. It's so comfortable under the palm, but perhaps more importantly really improves the sound of a guitar - you can hear just how different the tone is unplugged, and plugged in it is just so direct and punchy...A lot about the bridge sounds like marketing bullshit but it does actually translate into reality. I love the idea that it's a bridge engineered from the ground up to give optimal performance, rather than to look like what you see on most guitars.
Here are the specs:
Dæmoness Cimmerian body shape w/contemporary carve option
Set-neck construction with custom thumb notch
Flamed maple top on a swamp ash body
Hot pink finish on top (gloss), natural satin finish on body and neck
3-pc birdseye/flame maple neck w/birdseye maple board
20" radius, angled scalloped frets from 15-24
Thin "Flatbacker" neck profile
Black binding on neck/headstock, side block inlays (MOP)
Eye inlay design from Nolly's band Red Seas Fire's artwork
Bare Knuckle Pickups: Aftermath bridge, Sinner neck
Schaller Hannes bridge, Hipshot locking tuners
To find out more about Dylan Humphries you can watch a VIDEO where he talks about his guitar building philosophy. A must see!
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Last year Schaller ordered two demo T-Style guitars from Thomas Amberger who had the bright idea of designing base plates to mount the bridges on. One plate was made out of woven graphite composite and the other out of brushed aluminum. This resulted in a beautiful blend of the vintage T-Style look with a modern new bridge. The plates are made out of light materials which do not filter the sound produced by the light bridge. And they are perfectly flat for optimum contact with the guitar body, something which cannot be said about most traditional T-Style bridge base plates.
Due to increasing interest, Schaller is now offering these base plates and you can purchase them directly from Schaller at info@schaller-electronic.com.
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| MORIAH GUITARS ZADOK MODEL |
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Ken Hoover and John Mark Hampton started Zion guitars in 1980. They designed guitar models which are still being built today long after their departure from Zion. They recently felt the calling to start a new guitar company which they have called Moriah Guitarworks, www.moriahguitars.com, based out of North Carolina.
One of their new design is the Zadok which shows their extensive talent and experience, and the result is a very ergonomic, modernistic guitar which just begs to be played. Check out their web site for more info.
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| ROMAN RIST GUITAR |
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Finally another guitar from California, my neck of the woods, and it was worth the wait.
Roman Rist, www.ristguitars.com, based out of Hollywood for over twenty-five years and now located in Lake Shasta, is doing two guitars with the bridge and this is the first one. It's a T-Style/S-Style hybrid guitar with a spruce body and an all maple neck. When you combine that with Lindy Fralin Split-Blade pickups, which give you great single coil sounds without the hum, you've got yourself a guitar that should be in everybody's guitar gallery!
Here you can see a VIDEO of Marc Cooper doing a demo with the guitar.
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| HARTUNG CUSTOM GUITAR |
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A super guitar from Frank Hartung, www.hartung-guitars.com, who is widely recognized as one of the best builders in the world. He uses the bridge on some of his Diavolo guitars and he has just finished a custom one. You can go to this LINK for the specs.
What a way to end the 2010 gallery!
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