Checking for Brass or Steel

[tark]

I was just browsing some of the older threads. In the one querying the quality of the Ozark resos, Michael mentions his review of a similar model. In his review he expresses some uncertainty about the body material - is it steel or brass?

Here's an easy method for all writers of resonator reviews
To check take a small magnet and see if it is attracted to the various bits of the guitar. It's best to wrap the magnet in some tape or a piece of cloth so it doesn't scratch the finish.

Actually the weight of the guitar is dead giveaway for body material - if the guitar is really heavy its almost certainly steel, although with the magnet method you can be absolutely certain. With the magnet you can check the body, tailpiece and coverplate to see if they are of different materials. Nickel itself is a magnetic material, but there isn't enough in the nickel plating to cause a noticeable pull on the magnet on brass body guitars.

[Michael Messer]

Hi Tark,

Thank you for your post. As a collector of resophonic tin-cans and a historian on the subject, I have known about the magnet method for many years. I think you may have misunderstood my comment. My problem with the Ozark was that in the spec they claimed it was brass, but it was magnetic and therefore made of steel. Ozark & Stentor (the distributor) had no idea what I was talking about! I explained that it was not brass, but they insisted it was.....so in the review I I explained what had happened.

Shine n,
Michael.

[mirrormist]

Hello Tark...i tried a magnet to check out my AMG2 tricone some time back as i originally thought it to be steel...infact it is brass and yes you are also correct with a slight magnetic pull from the plating.

Not sure whether it was on my NRP my AMG2 or both but found a distinct magnetic pull in the cone support area.

So maybe the cone supports or the brazing rod compound is magnetic of sorts...I should know based on my background but can't remember the constituants of brazing rods...if indeed that is what is used to hold the supports to the body.

hi michael guess you replied whilst i was composing:)

[Michael Messer]

Hi Anthony & Tark,

The Ozark was definitely steel. I opened it and looked at the non-plated interior.

Shine On,
Michael

[mirrormist]

Hello michael my comments were not related to any review you may have done...just thought 'd clear that up

hello tark...the weight thing would only be obvious if you were familiar with or had both steel and brass resos together...anothor factor to take into consideration would be the material gauge used.

also the magnet can be a good tool for checking out inferior stainless steel...the last company i worked for used quality stuff my current emplyers use use a lesser quality...it looks the same but it aint

[mirrormist]

Hello again

while we are on the subject of magnets...i thought i would mention that i find a cuople of button magnets useful for holding tab or lyric print offs (a4) to a metal music stand

[tark]

admin said:

Hi Tark,

Thank you for your post. As a collector of resophonic tin-cans and a historian on the subject, I have known about the magnet method for many years. I think you may have misunderstood my comment. My problem with the Ozark was that in the spec they claimed it was brass, but it was magnetic and therefore made of steel. Ozark & Stentor (the distributor) had no idea what I was talking about! I explained that it was not brass, but they insisted it was.....so in the review I I explained what had happened.

Shine n,
Michael.

Hi, Michael,

Yes I obviously did misunderstand. Sorry.

How can you tell what the material is from looking at the inside? All the bodies I have seen are plated inside, although the finish obviously isn't as good as the outside. So, steel or brass the surface you see is nickel plate. I guess if you scratch it the steel bodies show copper through the scratch while the brass bodies show brass.

I do get the impression that you cannot trust product descriptions from the non-specialist retailers and distributors. I think they feel a metal resonator is more likely to sell if they describe it as being made of 'bell' brass rather than steel. Also they may change their sources of supply for a roughly equivalent instrument and don't bother to change the description.

Following Mirrormists post I got a bit of a shock. I just happened to check the sound well of my Amistar Style 2. Although the body is definitely made from brass the sound well is steel !!

I wondered why the nickel plate on the sound well was so horribly rough. Now I know, they obviously didn't bother to copper treat the steel first before soldering it to the top, but just soldered the body together and chucked the whole thing into the plating bath. I wonder if that's just a pragmatic/economy thing or if they reckon having a steel well has a tonal advantage.

Did National ever mix body and well materials like that?

[michaelsegui]

Yes National did sometimes mix materials (brass back and sides, steel top) etc....

I understand that NRP is now using brass on the sides of their Delphis and steel for the top and backs...

[Michael Messer]

Hi Tark,

I don't think the people manufacturing & selling budget resophonic guitars care what they are made out of, they just want to sell them. I agree that 'bell brass' sounds cool and that is why they put it in the spec sheet. When I called Stentor about this guitar, they really did not understand my question and they didn't care. One metal guitar is what you asked for....one metal guitar is what you have been sent!!!! is roughly their approach.

You are right - I opened the Ozark and scratched the surface until I could see the metal.

C'est la vie!
Shine On,
Michael

[LouisianaGrey]

I don't think the Koreans make brass bodies at all. I remember when Gremlin were importing 14 fret Ashburys from Korea they told me they'd asked the makers if they would do brass bodies as well but they weren't interested. When the Chinese got involved brass bodies became common on budget resos, which explains why the Ozark is steel but the Vintage is brass.

It's difficult to unravel because despite the large number of brands on the headstock there's only a few factories exporting Far Eastern resophonic guitars and I suspect there's even less factories actually making the bodies. The producers don't want to tell you who's making them in case you cut them out and go direct and most people in the trade don't know why we care whether they're brass or steel as log as they look OK from the outside.

[mirrormist]

Hello Pete

Just wondering what you are basing your assertion that Koreans didn’t make brass bodies on?
I have a Vintage AMG2 non magnetic body which I have been told “because of the wider neck” originated from Korea so i would be interested to know it's history.
Now I don’t know where it originates and I really didn’t care whether it was brass or steel when I bought it…as I said earlier I thought it was steel but that was mainly based on the cost.

One might suspect that the suppliers probably do know their markets if indeed what you presume to be the case is fact.
How many first time buyers of metal bodied resonator guitars would have researched the knowledge that folk that frequent this forum have obtained?
Do most buyers of these budget guitars care whether they are brass or steel just as long as they can play them and they look the part?

Also it would be easy to overlook that some of these budget guitars not only look the part but in fact are the part

I agree that if it is difficult to unravel origin now it will be even more difficult for collectors in the future to work out their history…but that is half the fun (research)…and I have no doubt that some of these guitars will be collectables one day.

Players update their guitars for obvious reasons but collectors I suspect may wish that they had left them alone

Best wishes

[LouisianaGrey]

I should have been a bit clearer and said I meant the 14 fret instruments, but the only 14 fret brass bodied resos I've seen have been Chinese and they've all come out of the AXL factory. Every reso I've ever seen that was definitely Korean in origin has had a steel body. As far as I am aware Vintage have always been made only in China from the day they first came out ( I'm sure I saw their first year at the BMF). I certainly wouldn't take the neck width as an indication because the Korean resos have narrower necks than the modern Chinese ones. However it's not a clear-cut situation because many of the Vintage/Johnson models that are definitely Chinese have the same bodies as Ozarks which I have been assured by Stentor are made in Korea. If that is the case I suspect that the bodies are made in China and the rest of the work is done in Korea, and it may be that that was always the case even with the steel bodied ones. As you say, what really matters is whether the guitars do the job and I think nowadays they do, whether they're Korean or Chinese.

[tark]

This is probably chewing over a subject that has been already been discussed to death, but I can't resist adding another post.

I think there are two major considerations for budget resos;

1. Are they cosmetically attractive - this varies between looking authentic and looking almost gaudy (lots of shell and 'gold' plated bits).

2. Are they cheap to produce, allowing them to sell at budget prices.

The steel / brass issue has an effect on both of these since it is easier to produce a good polished nickel finish on brass. On the other hand steel is cheaper and the Chinese seem to have perfected getting a very good finish on it.

My impression is that the Koreans are better at producing a consistent quality of product, but this is probably partly because they seem to be building to a slightly higher build and sell price than the Chinese. My experience of Chinese guitars is that they tend to cut costs on the bits you can't see easily, final assembly can be very sloppy and that the quality varies a lot. As Michael has observed before, it's a shame because the basic materials are the same as National's, the Koreans and the Chinese certainly have the ability to make excellent instruments if they wanted to, if only they would spend time on the details to make them play well and sound good. But then something has to give somewhere and I'm sure their guitars would be more expensive if they did.

As delivered to the shops most of these budget resos don't sound very good, often due to poor setup, 'hubcap' cones and being fitted with light gauge acoustic strings. It seems that every time a manufacturer does start to get it right with a better cone etc. the importer switches to a cheaper supplier.

I'm almost sure that I saw 'Made in Korea' stickers on the Vintage AMG2 Tricones of a few years ago. These had quite wide unbound necks with ablone markers, lightweight black painted die cast bridges and spun, cone-shaped cones. The current version. which is Chinese made, is a very different guitar. For one thing it has very thick heavy domes not cones and a very heavy sandcast bridge. The Chinese seem to have copied J Dopyeras original patent drawings, which show domed or bowl shapd resonators.

[LouisianaGrey]

Just to show how difficult it is to tie this issue down I've been working on two used single-cone Vintage brand guitars from different years. One had a a "sieve" coverplate and a body identical to the old Korean steel-bodied brands (Ozark, Antoria, Samick etc.) although the neck was slightly different. The other one had a "chicken feet" coverplate and a different body which was the same as a number of brands which I know to be Chinese. In fact the second one looked identical to the AMG1 currently on the Vintage website - except that unlike their description the body is steel, not brass, and the plating is nickel, not chrome.