The Steel Guitar Forum

...with these Harmos steels?

http://www.harmosmusic.com

I followed the link from your website--these things are crazy! I had no idea these existed. Have you played one before?

Do all the models have the same geodesic structure?

That pedal steel must be the lightest one on the market.

What does everyone think of these guitars? I'm interested to know.

~Dm

Man, you scared me ....

I have never had the privilege to play one ...

Maybe Santa be be kind to me this year

Sorry, Rick; didn't mean to scare you.

I thought you may have had experience with these fascinating guitars, they seem up your alley.

Perhaps a cast-aluminum-geodesic-frame-horseshoe pickup BuckyPan lap steel is in the future?

<SMALL>I thought you may have had experience with these fascinating guitars, they seem up your alley</SMALL>

More than you know ...

At first glance ... the "Dustpan" may be conceived as the "Anti- Harmos" ... super heavy, primitive casting manufacturing, etc ...

But when you take a good look at Sage's "Macro" Octet Truss design and cast aluminum's crystalline features ... you will see that they actually are pretty much the same.

Aluminum exists as repeating "Face Centered Cubic" Unit Cells (FCC)....



These exist in repeating arrays ... arranged in a "Cubic Close Packed" (CCP) Crystal Lattice ...





This sets up intrametallic tetrahyderal and octahyderal configurations ...









... which is very similar to the configuration associated with Bucky Fuller's Geodesics ... and Sages "Space Frame".

Pretty cool ... huh (well, for me anyway)

Sorry for the chemistry lesson ... the school year is startin' and I'm feelin' alittle left out (my last year was '98-'99)

<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Rick Aiello on 31 August 2004 at 05:02 PM.]</p></FONT>

I contacted the manufacturer to find out how to try one before buying. They do not have a distribution network except for the couple listed on their website ( http://www.harmosmusic.com/retailers.htm ), but they do have two 8-string demo lap steels that they send around the country to prospective customers to try out. You just need to give them a credit card number for a deposit to ensure you'll return it.

The person that contacted me with the info about the demos is:
James Baecker
Harmos Music, Ltd.
612.382.5393

Hey Rick, THANKS for the chemistry lesson!!!!
It's so cool to see more "detail"....at times, I think I might even understand this stuff!
Pretty pictures with my morning coffee....the start of another great day

Jay

While I'm at it ...

Another similarity between these seemingly "opposing designs" ... is their fundamental frequency.

After reading Sage/James' excellent text on Resonance ... I remembered my "ping test" ... striking the cast steel with my wifes rubber reflex hammer.

Heres the spectrum analysis ... for Ping

<font size=1> Steiner, sorry about the non-musical demo clip</font>



That was the prototype ... pingin' the others produced slightly different peak frequencies ... but all were above 800 Hz.

Pretty

<font size =1> Ok, I'll stop ... just goofin' around ... tryin' out my screen capture program </font>

<SMALL>Steiner, sorry about the non-musical demo clip</SMALL>

Huh? Wasn't that the main theme from "Das Boot"??


Steinar

------------------
www.gregertsen.com

Rick, I'd like to hear that Ping with a sledgehammer, because I have a very heavy right hand.

Steinar -- It's been a while since I've awarded one, but that line deserves a Rimshøt!

I just got a Harmos Model One w/Chicago pick up...it may be the best steel I have ever played...I have 3 National Dynamics, a Oahu Tonemaster, a Ricky Panda, & this thing beats them all. A great instrument!!!

A-ha! Rick, I knew you'd have some insight into this *matter*. (Ooh, pretty bad... that doesn't deserve a rim shot)

Looking at this "sphere packing" stuff...
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">quote:</font><HR><SMALL>
But when you take a good look at Sage's "Macro" Octet Truss design and cast aluminum's crystalline features ... you will see that they actually are pretty much the same. </SMALL><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
reminded me of Kurt Vonnegut's world-killing Ice-Nine.

Thanks for the input! Good information.

Don't go pouring any Aluminum-9, now.

I recently ordered a custom 7-string Harmos. It's basically a Model one, with two of Jason Lollars Stringmaster pickups. They special wired it for me with the blend pot. I'm calling it the Model 1+1. It's supposed to arrive here on Friday.
Sounds like your very happy with your new one Terry. That Chicago Steel pickup is a real killer. I put one in my Goldtone. Jason had to do a little customizing for it to fit, but it was well worth it. Still has all the highs but without the harshness of the origional pu. Glad your digging yours.

Roger

Wait a minute... I knew there was something spacey about these steels. Something "Space:1999"-ey.
http://www.shipbrook.com/jeff/raytrace/graphics/eagle-beautyshot1.jpg
http://www.starstore.com/acatalog/Eagler_Transporter_L.jpg

Yes Roger....I am very happy with mine...I will do a post on "My New Harmos" after I play it out a few more times...I like to really check a new instrument out. One thing that I didn't mention before is how well it stays in tune. This weekend I played an out door job from 12:00 noon till 4:00...outside, high 90's, on black pavement. My strat have to be tuned about ever 3rd song, the Harmos never lost tuning over 3 sets...I could not be happier!

Since my name is on this thread title ... heres my thoughts on Sage and James' steel.

When I first saw the website (several years ago) ... I thought ... "Genius"

Here's a guy basing his design on one of the most stable configurations in nature.

So I emailed Sage ... introduced myself ... and started talking about ... Buckminsterfullerene ... C60 ... "Bucky Balls"



At the time this was an exciting topic ... a new form of elemental carbon ... dissimilar to graphite and diamond.

Anyway, this set up some very friendly emails between Sage and myself ...

I have always wanted one ... each year I seem to put buying one off ... comin' up with something "new" to have them do for mine ...

This year ... cast aluminum "ends" and a hybrid neodymium horseshoe magnet system (I've talked to Jason about it).... and an etched crystal fretboard ...

So I can enjoy the view ...

------------------

<font size=1>HorseshoeMagnets</font>

<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Rick Aiello on 01 September 2004 at 05:01 PM.]</p></FONT>

Geez Rick. And here I was thinking I was getting all fancy with the Stingmaster pickups. I'd sure like to see and hear the "Rick Aiello" model. Let us know when you finally take the plunge.

Roger

or the plunger......we're interested in everything you do...

well, almost. (TMI - too much info ...)

I meant TMI about the plunger.


Rick - the metallurgy stuff is extremely cool.
Does cryogenic treatment do anything?

I know they say it makes steel strings better, but does it do anything to aluminum?

-paul<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Paul Arntson on 01 September 2004 at 10:35 PM.]</p></FONT>

Cryo treatment is generally associated with relieving stress caused by heat treating ... and the formation of strengthening "precipitates".

Some aluminum alloys are heat treatable ... others are not. The A356 I use is.

The lady who does the cryo treatment of my steel magnets ... does a huge number of aluminum softball and baseball bats ... kinda her "bread and butter".

They also do alot of brass musical instruments and cymbals.

I may send one up to her eventually ... just to see (or should I say hear)the difference.

When I started trying the Dean Markley cryo guitar strings, I had been breaking about a string a day, but I couldn't manage to break a "Blue Steel" string; the whole set usually got changed before any of them snapped. They also held their tone for quite a long time.

The problem was, I was trying to play noisy rock at the time, and all those nasty *notes* kept cutting through the distortion. The strings seemed *too* bright to me (I was younger and dumber then).

A few questions...

Has anyone had tried cryogenically treated strings on a steel? They seem like they would be well suited--strong, bright.

And to Rick-- it sounds like the Dustpan and the Harmos are on a collision course, after all. Would there be any point to designing, for example, an aluminum-faced steel with that kind of octet truss system in the body?

Could a truss built of something other than carbon fiber have even better acoustic properties?

Just curious. I love it when science and space-program technology come down to earth and find themselves at a barn dance.

<SMALL>I love it when science and space-program technology come down to earth</SMALL>

Sage and James sure have that covered

They will have to "ring in" about the materials, etc they have tried.

Me, I keep goin' further back in time ... lately readin' about bells.

Check these pages out ...

The Musical Bell

The Acoustics of Bells

Vibrational Holography

So many cool things to learn ... so little time <FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Rick Aiello on 02 September 2004 at 10:22 AM.]</p></FONT>

Neat. Makes me wish I'd stuck it out with university physics a little longer. If only they'd given us bells & steel guitars instead of poorly-photocopied handouts...

Are you familiar with Dr. Hans Jenny at all? Vibrational holography seems very similar to his research, which has been given the slightly flakey name "Cymatics".

He created beautiful, regular patterns in all sorts of inert media by putting them on metal plates and vibrating them with audible sound.

Some of the results were strikingly lifelike (exhibiting motion, the transfer of information, and "reproduction" of sorts).

I found a video at the library that had some very interesting examples, but it seems Jenny's work was somewhat co-opted by a man named Peter Guy Manners, who tried to turn Cymatics into a kind of new-age religion.

Anyway, it's pretty intersting, and one heck of an art form.
http://www.cymaticsource.com/cymaticsvideos.html

Dear Forumites,

Sorry to have missed a timely response to this string. We were pretty tied up in early September, actually through much of September. I just happened to Google some stuff and saw this string pop up.

Thank you to everyone who entered this string, especially Rick, Terry, Roger, Anita and Howard. We appreciate your past support and interest.

As seemed to be clearly outlined in this string, Sage initiated the Octet structure design based on his respect and belief in Buckminster Fuller’s genius. Sage started by putting the Harmos (t.m.) design to the sound/tone test. i.e. He built it and it sounded good when played. With my technical background, I looked at the design and applied physical parameters to it. This forum string seems to be focused on the physics of the design, so I’ll follow up here rather than Sage - who continues to be very busy making a living in Colorado.

It was cool to see and hear the spectrum of Rick’s Dust Pan body. Since the Frypan/Dustpan design is considered an excellent sounding instrument, the ~800 Hz peak resonance frequency for the Dust Pan is probably an excellent endorsement of the concept of raising the peak resonance frequency to get a good sound. For anyone here who isn’t familiar with the Harmos design, raising the peak resonance frequency of the guitar body is one of the basic physics features of Harmos technology. See http://www.harmosmusic.com/tech.htm and/or Harmos Music, Ltd’s US Patent #6,787,688 (Issued September 7, 2004.).

In addition to increasing the resonant frequency, another frequency spectrum feature in the Harmos patent #6,787,688 is that there is minimal db roll off just above the peak resonance frequency. The average resonance amplitudes hold within 2 db of the peak amplitudes all the way out to 3,000 Hz. In addition, the Harmos body rolls off very very gently above 3,000 Hz. So, rather than sounding like a bell, which rings primarily at one or two frequencies, the Harmos body tends to vibrate like a bunch of ”small bells” at many frequencies. These “small bells” are located across the overtone frequency range. They get excited (rung) when a string overtone hits them and since their amplitudes are approximately equal, we believe this helps support a balanced timbre and clean sound at all pitches and high volume.

We didn’t test all wood or aluminum structures. Sage’s original prototype had some wood struts and the guitar sounded pretty good with them, but after changing to all Carbon Fiber struts, we agreed that the sound was cleaner and a little sweeter.

I hope that provides some background on most of the questions. Obviously, if there are more, I’ll keep an eye out for them and get back a little faster this time.

Best Regards,
James

<SMALL> especially Rick, Terry, Roger, Anita and Howard.</SMALL>

I can't believe you thanked me for the plunger joke..

Anytime James. The Harmos is a great innovation.

Rick Aiello....I know you're driving to Joliet, so I hope I catch you here prior to your leaving.

I have a special surprise for you! Hopefully I'll be posting photos from the HSGC. Ya'll are gonna have to wait for this!