Basic purpose of the classic acoustic designs

[JimH]

Hello, can anybody point me in the direction of a source that would briefly and simply explain the differences and more to the point the purpose of the differences of the basic (i.e. Martin) designs - Like 0 - 000 OM, etc. I realise they're different sizes and have different bracing patterns but I'd like to know why. All I get from martin is how great they all are rather than their design brief. I think any hardcore luthier sites assume that you'd already know this, so I'm asking TGP who seem a decent bunch!

Thanks

[daddyo]

Early steel string acoustic design was driven by the need to be heard before amplification. Early steel strings were essentially classical guitars with beefier bracing. Then as guitarists joined with other instruments and began to play, the guitar got larger and larger in a quest for volume till you got the dreadnaughts and jumbos. These styles got imprinted into our imaginations and ears so that now the dreadnaught is the most common style even though even very inexpensive guitars have good pickup systems. Smaller body styles like OM, OO, etc are very popular among fingerstyle players.

[JimH]

Thanks - yeah I get that. So what were martin thinking with the OO and OM? Was it merely gradations of style and size? (and hence volume?) or were there other factors at work that dictated their conception. - ie tone, cost etc.

[daddyo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.F._Martin_&_Company
http://www.valvette.us/rique/martin_models.html

Try these.

[JimH]

thank you - second link very useful - I dug out a good book today too.

Cheers.

[Nuclearfishin]

It boils down to nut width, scale length, and bracing pattern. These are the three things that have the biggest affect on sound/playability for the style of music you play. I would decide how you plan on playing the guitar most of the time, and from there it will pretty much determine which style guitar is best for that application. How do you want to use it most?

[JimH]

Well I'm basically thinking about O OO OOO and OM. I see the scale length issue for number of frets before the neck join and upper fret access and realise this will effect the tone too. The body size stuff is pretty obvious but not found much on the effect of bracing patterns yet. - I use guitars in pretty much all ways - chord strumming, relatively quick single note stuff, finger style, jazz, slide etc. I'm not asking what's best as I know there isn't one and I don't really go for the do-it-all idea anyway. Personally I prefer a wider nut but after that interested in what they're supposed to be able to do better or worse I suppose.