While in Ireland on holiday Marco took the opportunity
tocome to the workshop to chose the woods for his Longscale
ASAPJ. He chose well picking some of the best Irish walnut
(with a slight flame) that I had for the back and sides as
well as the last unusually coloured cedar top I had in
stock. The idea of a longscale acoustic guitar (the scale is
690mm as opposed to the normal 649mm) is that the tension on
the strings at concert pitch is greater than on a normal
scale but when a dropped tuning is used the lowered strings
are still at good tension so are not 'flappy' allowing for a
betterl action and better intonation. If you use dropped
tunings playing a long scale is a revelation and you won't
want to go back to a normal scale guitar.
The neck on Marco's guitar is mainly sapele with a centre
splice of the Irish walnut to match the back, sides and
headstock veneer. The Highlander pickup in the Rio rosewood
bridge handles long scales as well as it handles everything
else - perfectly. Acoustically this guitar is rich and
resonant. Lacewood bindings and Irish walnut rosette
complete the package.
For more about the longscale acoustic guitars go to the
Longscale Page
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Acoustics