Tubular bracing for a musical instrument
OwnerStephen Davis, C. Malcolm Bashinventors
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A tubular bracing assembly for a string instrument and the resulting string instrument. Resin reinforced fibers are shaped into the form of a tubular structure. The tubular structure decreases the weight and increases the stiffness of the structure. The result is a bracing system that has very light weight and varied stiffness properties to achieve desirable acoustic performance from the hollow body of an acoustic instrument.
Claims18
A string instrument assembly, comprising;
- a resonance chamber defined at least in part by a sound board and at least one side wall;
- and
- tubular bracing reinforcing at least part of said soundboard within said resonance chamber, wherein said tubular bracing includes at least one tube element that extends between a first end and a second end, each said tube element defining at least one complete interior channel that extends between said first end and said second end wherein each said tube element has a flat side that abuts against said sound board;
- and
- side bracing for reinforcing said at least one side wall of said resonance chamber.
In a string instrument having a resonance chamber defined by a soundboard a backboard and at least one side wall, wherein said resonance chamber requires varying degrees of reinforcement in predetermined areas, a method of reinforcing the resonance chamber, comprising the steps of:
- providing elements of tubular bracing, each element of tubular bracing having a first end, a second end and at least one flat mounting section disposed between said first end and said second end, wherein each element of tubular bracing defines at least one interior channel;
- attaching each said flat mounting section of each element of tubular bracing directly to said soundboard within said resonance chamber, wherein said elements of tubular bracing reinforce said predetermined areas of said soundboard.
A string instrument assembly, comprising;
- a resonance chamber defined at least in part by opposing sounding surfaces that are both affixed to opposite ends of at least one side wall;
- a plurality of hollow tubular bracing elements, each hollow tubular bracing element having a first end, a second end and at least one flat mounting section disposed between said first end and said second end,
- wherein each flat mounting section is adhered directly to at least one of said sounding surfaces, therein providing reinforcement within said resonance chamber.
A string instrument assembly, comprising;
- a resonance chamber defined at least in part by a sound board and at least one side wall;
- tubular bracing reinforcing at least part of said soundboard within said resonance chamber, wherein said tubular bracing defines at least part of an interior compartment when in abutment with said soundboard;
- and
- side bracing for reinforcing said at least one side wall of said resonance chamber wherein said side bracing is tubular and defines at least one channel that runs through said side bracing from a first end to a second end.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.