“Everest” Archtop Guitar
This 18″ oval holed archtop guitar was constructed with a long-aged Sitka spruce soundboard, master grade curly red maple back and sides, and a curly maple neck. The fretboard, bridge, tailpiece, binding, peghead overlay and diamond inlays are ebony. The yellow purfling and accent lines are Canary wood left in its natural state with some small flecks of red occurring in the bold yellow color. The soundboard is braced similar to my L7 style archtops. It has an X brace along with perpendicular braces at either end of the X.
There are two custom made, hand wound Kent Armstrong pickups with this guitar. In these photos, the humbucker is attached to the end of the fretboard. That pickup can be replaced with a P-90 style, which also conforms to the curvature of the fretboard and sound hole.
This instrument has a very open sound, somewhat like that of a great flattop guitar, while still offering the clarity and note separation of a great archtop. The attached video perfectly demonstrates these properties after a brief interview about the guitar.