singemonkey wrote
Looks ostentatious and absurd to me.
I'm guessing that it might redistribute some forces around the top. It's clear from this picture
that those string posts exert some tension on the top. You can see the reinforcment at the mounting points.
Now with a conventional steel string flat top you would expect the strings to be pulling the back of the bridge upwards a little and thus there would some downwards distortion immediately ahead of the bridge (IE the bridge roatest slightly under tension). OK... this is part of the reason why you have bracing, to stop the tension caused by the strings from pulling the top to pieces.
So, it may be that this system moves some of those tensions away from the bridge, towards the edges of the lower bout.
That said, he's using ladder bracing, and big braces, and I'd expect that to stabilise the bridge area. There's also a brace running between the two main braces, from the soundhole, past the bridge to nearly the heel. More stiffness.
So I dunno.... I know that if you talk to Mervyn Davis he has a reason for the various elements of his Smoothtalker design. It's not just about striking looks. So it would be interesting to talk to Jeff Babicz and listen to his reasoning. Not that I would know if he was having me on or not.
I suspect that changing strings is going to be a real pain.
