COVER FEATURE WILKINSON Wilkinson – the only man in Britain
who had managed to challenge the US monopoly on advanced guitar vibrato systems and components – had unique experience here. He had a reputation among players, had sold branded products to the big international guitar companies, been an early pioneer in sourcing reliable Far Eastern licensing without getting his ideas stolen – in short, he had credibility in the international guitar world. It was that experience and insight that made him set two initial conditions for his involvement in the project. The first was that it had to retro fit an American standard Stratocaster, the second, that it had to sell at an affordable price. Two conditions which, particularly in the light of what Gibson debuted ten years later, shows the sort of market nous for which Wilkinson is famed. At this point in the interview, Wilkinson
launches into a fascinating account of the technical struggles the team (which included Richard Whittall, a digital engineer, a mechanical engineer and himself) had to overcome. It’s to be hoped that one of the guitar magazines will find
“
Team work “I do want to set the record straight about this, “ Wilkinson continues. “This wasn’t a solo effort. For example, ten years ago I brought into the team a lad called Andy Leadbetter, straight out of college with an honours degree in mechanical engineering. At that time we thought we were going to have to construct the whole gearbox ourselves, which was a nightmare project to undertake. Andy came to the project without the slightest knowledge of guitars and that has more or less defined my role, which has been as designer and taskmaster. I supplied my knowledge of guitars, vibrato systems and fixed bridges and he did the leg work. That’s how this has worked – it’s been a team project. “Richard Whittall, as the managing
director, has raised capital and all the essential things that go to make something like this a reality. For 14 years we’ve been an R&D company – there’s been no money coming in, it’s been just going out. “ Wilkinson also stresses the contribution of Dave Goodway, the digital engineer
There is so much I could tell you. We don’t look after our own in this country. Even with sales in
hand, you still can’t raise money from a bank. Trevor Wilkinson
space for this story – which we, concentrating on the business angle, do not have – because for anyone interested in guitars, engineering or turning an idea into a product, it must rank alongside the Dyson saga for interest.
Britannia’s business Our focus, being on business, needs to record the difficulty Wilkinson says the team faced in trying to get support – the familiar tale that has left the UK with an unmatched record of patents and an empty treasure chest, as waves of inventors have been spurned by banks. For all the talk of ‘cool Britannia’ and the posing of government ministers with rock stars, no-one from government was interested in helping the ATD come to life and the banks proved equally as unenthusiastic. Wilkinson and the team were on their own. Help came from other companies – including Maxon Motor, German gear makers founded by the Braun family (of electric razor fame) and Turchan, a US company that had developed a revolutionary process using lasers, employed to grow diamonds on the ATD’s bridge saddles and Shadow electronics, again in Germany. With these three working alongside the British quartet (which, itself underwent some design personnel changes along the way) the product was, finally, brought to production, though it took an exhausting 14 years to do so.
28 miPRO OCTOBER 2010
who was a key component in the team. “The other partners included Maxon. They make planetary gearboxes and I need to explain why that matters. We’ve got to be able to have enough torque to turn a 52 gauge string around a capstan the size of a tuning key, within the confines of a vibrato block in a bridge, and we can’t go any deeper than 45 mm because 13
⁄4 inches is the thickness of a
Strat body. That means I needed to find gearboxes and motors within that size. I knew Maxon made a planetary gearbox and after a bit of a giggle at our prototype, they said they could do it. They saw it. I think, as a challenge – a way to demonstrate their skills. They’ve invested a lot of time and money and I’m very grateful for their involvement. “We’ve had so many things happen like that – Maxon was a strategic partner – and so was Turchan. A problem we needed solving was reducing friction on the bridge saddles without sacrificing the sound of a Strat. Turchan had that technology and they’ve been invaluable. “
Lift off The launch vehicle for the ATD self-tuner was the Fret King Super-Matic. Without wanting to belittle Fret King,
wasn’t that a low-key launch for such an exciting product? Wouldn’t it have made more impact on a Fender or an Ibanez? Wilkinson has an intriguing answer. “The device is available to every guitar company in the world and has been since
Wilkinson with the ADT auto-tune fitted Fret King Super-Matic
the start. The reason that it has appeared first in the Fret King Super-Matic is simply because Dennis Drumm at JHS had had the guts and the foresight to say ‘We’ll do that – put it in one of our guitars’. It’s just the fact that Dennis was prepared to do it before anyone else. “ So, what held back the rest of the world? Does Wilkinson think that Gibson could have shot the auto-tuning fox with its Robot – putting guitarists off the whole idea? “I don’t think they damaged the market – I think they damaged themselves. I think in some ways they did us a favour as they did bring something to the mass market by making people aware that the technology exists and actually
does work. And there’s no doubt that the Gibson technology does work – it’s just that it works within certain limitations. “But not only do I think Gibson have
damaged themselves, I think Tronical have damaged themselves, too, by taking it to market with an exclusive company. “ Herein lies what could prove to be ATD
and Wilkinson’s smartest move, or biggest mistake. It isn’t hard to imagine a deal being struck with a major guitar manufacturer to offer the ATD as an exclusive product – but Wilkinson is sure that would be the wrong thing to do. “In an ideal world I’d like to have seen
it available from every single guitar brand in the world. But to have gone from nothing to producing 10,000 bridges a
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