With the improvement in living standards, our demand for Musical Instruments is also getting more and more attention. In addition to pursuing basic use, we gradually pay attention to the brand’s technology and cultural added value. As a wooden guitar manufacturing company developed for nearly two hundred years, Martin Company has increasingly attracted the attention of most guitar enthusiasts.
While you want to know the history of Martin guitars and the brand culture, you inevitably have a strong interest in the materials they use on their guitars. Careful enthusiasts will note that Martin’s wooden guitar completely lacks the traditional wood composite panels widely used by other companies but uses a relatively unfamiliar abbreviation, HPL. We see the X series guitar with these back panels and full HPL material; in Little Martin Inside, LXM / LXK2 / LX BLACK is also full HPL. So, what is this material that we feel is strange to us?
As a traditional material, wood is widely used in every aspect of life, but due to its limitations, such as waterproof, insect-proof, and size, let to make Users hope to expand the availability and application range of wood through artificial means, so the composite plates came into being. The invention of the composite plate can even go back to 3000 BC; as early as the early 1st century BC, the Romans were familiar with the veneer manufacturing technology and the principle of plywood manufacturing.
1. In 1812
The French invented the single-board saw cutter. In 1834, France issued a patent for a planning machine. The development of materials, along with the pace of human progress and the development of wood composite panels, can enable navigators from all countries to cross the ocean to farther places to discover the unknown and explore the world.
2. In the 1870s
Electricity entered the production field; in the 1880s, the internal combustion engine was developed successfully; in 1855, Benz succeeded; in 1903, Aircraft was successfully trial-produced. With the progress of science and technology, the traditional wooden composite board could no longer meet the needs of the development of science and technology at that time, and people urgently needed a new material that could keep up with the pace of the rapid progress of science and technology. So as a result, many scientists started their research.
3. In 1896
A Belgian-American chemist (Leo Baekeland) mixed phenol and formaldehyde to produce a resin product that could be converted into an insoluble polymer called a phenolic resin. And, by adding some sawdust stuffing, he got a plastic, very dark material. In 1907, he filed and patented it after his surname, Bakelite, which was the predecessor of today’s high-pressure laminate HPL.
This material has excellent performance, is different from the traditional composite plate, and has insulation, so it soon won the electronic industry, successfully replacing ceramics and mica as the excellent isolation material in electronic equipment. The HPL was applied in many other fields, from sound and electricity to thermal isolation, agriculture, textiles, and aviation. However, due to poor light resistance, the phenol-formaldehyde polymer’s use range is still limited, and these early HPL laminates can only be black or brown.
4. In 1906
Meanwhile, in 1906, Leibich focused his research on melamine formaldehyde; he found that the melamine formaldehyde resin and cellulose mixed and generated a very good solid after polymerization reaction material; it is stable to light, wear resistance, and not conducive. In the 1940s, it can be well used in melamine formaldehyde decorative paper material technology development, making beautification possible. He can make the board a more pleasing, more decorative exterior surface.
5. In the 1950s
Finally, in the 1950s, based on the research of previous scientists, HPL materials in the modern sense were the first commercially produced in the United States. This material is revolutionary and different from traditional composite plates and other materials. Its plasticity and insulation give it a wider range of applications, corrosion resistance, longer service life, and the outermost decorative layer, without paint, paint, wood plywood wallpaper, and other additional decoration and treatment. This new material has achieved great success due to its dual advantages of aesthetics and functionality!
It first had great success in kitchen furniture, especially in the pattern “American” kitchen, where tables, shelves, bars, and various places that were once wooden and wood composite panels were all replaced by it. In the following decades, innovation and development of new HPL opened the door to different market areas and more obscure potential applications, with a wide range of products, from HPL in the’60s to an HPL; from laminate to the furniture industry; from compression varieties to varieties mixed with various materials. Scientists have turned their imagination into reality, and the application and research of HPL will continue.
The development of Martin’s guitar was also accompanied by the footsteps of human exploration of the world: in 1926, Konter, as a volunteer of Robert Byrd’s ‘first expedition to the Arctic, carried Martin’s ukulele to the Arctic. Martin’s ukulele became the first musical instrument to travel to the North Pole! After Konter completed many of his trips, he became a writer and wrote many things like Dick’s Ukulele Method and Dick’s Improved Ukulele Method. He also donated the Martin Ukulele, which he signed with his Arctic trip and many footprints, to the Martin Museum. He was affectionately known as the “Ukulele Dick.”
THE KONTER UKULELE is extant at the Martin Guitar Museum with the signatures of almost all the celebrities in the American political and scientific circles at the time.
7. In 1993
In 1993, Martin also produced a high-quality portable guitar ——Backpacker! Humans take it to enjoy the music journey with Martin guitar, footprints over the road of scientific research! In 1994, it also went to the NASA space station!
The Martin Guitar Company, realizing the wide applicability and durability of HPL materials, has revolutionized this new material in guitar manufacturing. On the good side, It beats the composite board used to make guitars and allows music lovers to take their favorite Martin products to all solid wood and composite wood instruments.
On nautical trips, you can carry it, and it is not like a composite board instrument, afraid of high moisture disintegrating the adhesive layer.
For the American soldiers who go to war or return home triumphantly, only the guitar and music can comfort them on the high-pressure and dangerous battlefields. The development of materials is accompanied by the progress of science and technology and the pace of human exploration of the world. The generation of new materials for application has always catered to the development of science and technology and the needs of human beings. Of course, not every new material will be immediately known and accepted, just like the development of alternating current, once difficult steps. However, the facts have proved that, as long as it goes through the test of time and meets development needs, people will widely recognize and accept it.
Martin Guitar Company, in the present nearly 200 years of history, constantly adhere to the classic and also constantly step forward; several revolutions in the wooden guitar industry in history this one Small company has experienced and completed, and they have been walking at the forefront of the industry. HPL materials, which have lasted for 120 years, have also achieved great success in various fields, like Martin’s wooden guitar, and have experienced the test of time and temper. So, are you so happy with such a beautiful HPL guitar that can accompany you almost anywhere? Did you have something that seemed completely impossible in the past?
Extended Reading:
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