You have articulated the conundrum. Joel van Lennep is probably basing his instruments on historical instruments. Spacing on historical instruments is sometimes impossible for us moderns. We might collectively be missing something. Either they had some string technology we are not aware of or they liked twang or they played very lightly near the bridge. Who knows?
I'll dig out my archlute and see what the spacing is. Again, I had the bridge re-drilled on it to give me more space on the double courses. On Jul 22, 2011, at 11:32 PM, Peter Nightingale wrote: Ed, Suzanne, Roman, Alexander, ... Thanks for your suggestions. I remain confused by colliding strings and ditto realities. I cannot believe that Joel van Lennep would make an instrument with the design flaws your comments imply. Could it be that my lute does not live up to your expectations, because it is a 14 course archlute. (BTW, Suzanne seems to have a space problem too.) The courses have to be close together for the instrument to be playable, it would seem. The distance between the string of the 6th and 7th courses is is roughly 4mm, 8mm, and 4mm. If pairs of the individual courses were to be 5mm apart, this would become 5mm, 6mm, 5mm. It would introduce a 6.5th course, a revolutionary design! My guess is that the compromise that was made tries to avoid the the clanging disaster by creating more space at the nut. Actually, there is more: the octave strings are slightly closer to the sound board than the fundamentals in both courses. Thanks again, Peter. the next auto-quote is: A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death. (Albert Einstein) /\/\ Peter Nightingale Telephone (401) 874-5882 Department of Physics, East Hall Fax (401) 874-2380 University of Rhode Island Kingston, RI 02881 To get on or off this list see list information at [1]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html Ed Durbrow Saitama, Japan [2]http://www.musicianspage.com/musicians/9688/ [3]http://www9.plala.or.jp/edurbrow/ -- References 1. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html 2. http://www.musicianspage.com/musicians/9688/ 3. http://www9.plala.or.jp/edurbrow/
