Anyone familiar with Tonerite system?

Reinhard

What it boils down to, is this device "plays in" your guitar and supposedly improves the tone.
Sounds like an interesting concept and can be used on vintage instruments that haven't been played in a while. The good old fashioned way is to play the hell out of your new acoustic/archtop etc. so it opens up, but if a shortcut is available to "better" tone, would you use it?

http://tonerite.com/

AlanRatcliffe

I looked into the other crowd doing this a couple of years ago. There is no scientific basis for anything like this actually doing anything worthwhile, it's all anecdotal.

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote: I looked into the other crowd doing this a couple of years ago. There is no scientific basis for anything like this actually doing anything worthwhile, it's all anecdotal.

IMO the premise is the old legend about how hillbilly flat pickers in the Ozarks and the Appalachians tune the radio to a non-stop bluegrass station and leave their new guitars leaning against the speaker cabinet so as to force feed them the right kind of vibrations.

A lot of players I know believe that you have to play a guitar for it to sound good, but, and as you say, there's nothing proven. Other guys I know think that age has something to do with it, but not playing.

Psean

Sounds like a gimmick to me

Beeg

I think that playing the hell out of your guitar ,doesn't make your guitar better, it does however make you better, and that is why the guitar sounds better.

Practice, not time.

?

Zulublues

+1 Beeg

I think that the same could be said about top end hifi speakers. The anoraks say that you must "burn in" your speakers for x number of hours before they sound optimal. Is it not just your ears becoming accustomed to the new speaker's sound ???

AlanRatcliffe

Zulublues wrote: The anoraks say that you must "burn in" your speakers for x number of hours before they sound optimal. Is it not just your ears becoming accustomed to the new speaker's sound ???

No, it's the cone becoming more flexible, particularly any doped areas. It's a quantifiable and measurable change. Unlike some of the cable claims the audiofools are prone to swallowing.

I don't argue that guitars mature over time - that's pretty much accepted as true by most. What I do say that the role that vibration plays in that aging/maturation is nebulous at best. Anyone who has built a guitar will tell you there is a short "settling in" period over the first day or so, but beyond that it's all down to slow processes like wood and finish curing that takes years with most.

guidothepimmp

yeh ive seen this being used on classical and acoustic fiddles when in for services or repairs..

The repairman thinks it works..

I think its a crock... between using this to vibrate the wood?! shees..

may as well use another aide to vibrate >☹

psyx

Well in metals you get a change in the crystal structure from use over years due to stresses applied to the metal. I dont know anything about wood structures, but if there is any basis to this theory of having to play a guitar to improve the tone, then it may be due to changes that occur in the structure of the wood due to vibrations that aid in the settling process

Chabenda

I swear by Snake oil ?

GaryMac

I swear by Snake oil

Hey Chabenda, are you drinking it or rubbing it on?????????????

GaryMac

racman

I always have a slightly different view on these things - if you think it works for you then it does, if you don't then it wont! ?

Chabenda

GaryMac wrote:
I swear by Snake oil
Hey Chabenda, are you drinking it or rubbing it on?????????????

GaryMac

Ha ha! GaryMac, rubbing it on, if I was drinking it I should be sounding a hell of a lot better by now!! ? :

Chabenda

guidothepimmp wrote: yeh ive seen this being used on classical and acoustic fiddles when in for services or repairs..

The repairman thinks it works..

I think its a crock... between using this to vibrate the wood?! shees..

may as well use another aide to vibrate >☹

I remember hearing, a few years, ago that the Stradivarius sound had something to do with the bacteria that existed in the water in those days. That as the wood was soaked, it absorbed these 'things' and that was 'instrumental' in the tone. Evidently, because of pollution, this is no longer the 'case'.

Music definitely sounds best when Mother Nature has her say!

Bob-Dubery

Chabenda wrote: I remember hearing, a few years, ago that the Stradivarius sound had something to do with the bacteria that existed in the water in those days. That as the wood was soaked, it absorbed these 'things' and that was 'instrumental' in the tone. Evidently, because of pollution, this is no longer the 'case'.

Music definitely sounds best when Mother Nature has her say!

Not that anybody alive know what a Stradivarius violin, as built by Stradivari, sounded like. All the surviving examples are modified.

Chabenda

So - it's back to the snake oil then :rolleyes: By the tot.

slyd

Alan Ratcliffe wrote:
Unlike some of the cable claims the audiofools are prone to swallowing. [? ? ? hehehe]

"settling in" period over the first day or so, but beyond that it's all down to slow processes like wood and finish curing that takes years with most.

Agreed 100%, all points. 8)