650 mm or 640 mm?
Keep the following rule at hand: If the distance between the tip of your thumb and the tip of your little finger is equal or less than 9 in. when fully stretched, use 640 mm. In stringed instrument performance, a single millimeter can mean the difference between playing effortlessly or the exact opposite. 

Hauser 9 braces all Spruce fan

Hauser 9 braces 3 woods fan

The double top with the 9 braces Hauser fan, was developed and introduced by  Master Luthier Manuel Contreras the II at the end of the 70s and reached its peak in the 80s. In this Variation of the Double top, a second top is located halfway between the main top and the back. It is held in place by means of little Mahogany bridges located above and below the second top along the inner part of the sides (frames 1 & 3). The second top rests on the upper bridges and once it is glued on each little bridge (frame 2), a second bridge is glued on top of the preceding corresponding bridge below the second top (frame 3). This second top vibrates a fraction of a second after the first one creating an immense sustain and punch using the air moving inside the sound box and thus creating a multiplying effect of the sonorous waves.

The 9 braces Hauser fan is the most thoroughly tested fan brace setup on the planet. It is the result of many years of experimenting. It is braced on Torres 4 fan brace design. The braces act as sound vibrations highways...they carry the vibration of each string to a specific spot on the soundboard. If you put your fingers on the soundboard as you play the 6th string for instance, you will feel the upper portion of the top vibrate with more power than the rest of the top.  You will be able to feel this vibrations with your fingertips all the way to the 4th strings. It is harder to feel the vibration caused by the treble strings. The variations on the 9 braces fan is enormous. Luthier taylor each fan to achieve a specific sound and match the instrument with the rest of the woods used in the construction. Above to the left is a 9 braces all Spruce fan. I often use a mixture of Cedar, Spruce and Mahogany to match different wood combinations.
 

Sinker logs, are pulled from the bottom of lakes and rivers. Sometimes, scuba divers are needed to achieve the extraction.  Most of these logs are hundreds of years old (In one of the pictures above, you can see that the tree was cut with an hatchet). Due to a series of factors (The logs were too big and heavy to be pulled out of the rivers or the logs were caught by currents and were sucked to the bottom)  these logs were trapped by the muddy buttons of these water beds and this created like a time capsule where the wood was preserved in fantastic humidity conditions that made the wood season in a slow natural way during many centuries. Some of the logs are selected for musical instruments construction. The sound that these woods produce is unique and the grain has a beautiful coloration that changes according to the type of mud present in the water bed.

Request the Signed POSTER 
23.6 in X 51 in