Are fanned fretboards incompatible with vibrato?

[Mark Hammer]

I was listenng to a Charlie Hunter concert recording today, and got to thinking about the Novak fanned fret system, which Charlie provides one heckuva good example of.

Can those things have workable vibrato arms, or is it one of the things you have to forfeit for the advantages that fanned frets provide?

[Brad1]

Looks like it would be quite a challenge with the staggered tailpieces at a slant. They are string-through, though, so it seems like it might be feasible to have some kind of whammy bar going through the body, attached to a springed vibrato block the strings go through, with maybe the saddles having rollers? Would be a weird angle to deal with.

That isn't even considering what would happen as far as the detuning with the low strings much longer than the high strings. Would they pitch down pretty much equally, or either the highs or lows detuning faster than the others?

I don't see how anyone would put something of a standard-type whammy on that thing.

Interesting question, though.

Brad1

[bob p]

Hijacking for a minute ...

I like the idea of the different length scales on the different strings. It really makes sense on instruments like 6-string basses, where you really need a longer scale to get a low B that doesn't sound flabby. It also makes the long scales easier to play for someone with smaller hands -- you only have to fight with the long scale with the really low notes, and the problem goes away as you move to the higher strings. But as you move up the registers, the position of the "neutral" fret (the vertical, non-slanted one) becomes cricital in these types of applications. IMO there's quite a bit to be gained from changing the bridge/headstock anchor points, to move the "neutral" point on the fretboard to a higher or lower fret. I'm not convinced that Novak or Dingwall necessarily put the neutral frets in the best locations.

I remember reading the Novak papers many years ago and smiling when he started talking about "clang tones." I have to admit, I think that Novak had a genuinely bright idea with the design of the fanned fretboard, but the entire dissertation on "clang tones" suggested that he didn't understand basic principles of convolution and deconvolution. In some respects, I think he did not fully understand his own invention. Not that it matters, really.

Doesn't the Novak patent expire sometime soon? IMO the concept would really benefit from having other luthiers working on variations in the design.