Designing the Ideal Guitar Pick
Read about the painstaking design and development that went into creating the best guitar pick in the industry
Carefully Selected Materials
Polyamide-imde (more at widipedia)
Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks are the result of a painstaking personal endeavor to develop the ideal guitar pick. Our Picks are formed from carefully selected materials. These specific grades of polyamide-imide are often used in aerospace applications as replacement for metallic alloys.
- The low friction coefficient makes Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks extremely fast playing.
- The high erosion resistance makes Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks ideal for enduring the punishment of stringed instrument play.
- Beyond this superior material, lies the depth of our pick design. Though our pick is thick compared to industry standards, we have incorporated a precision designed bevel. Subsequently, it plays as easily as a thin pick while offering the control and consistency of a thicker pick.
Three Optimized Playing Edges
Three Optimized Playing Edges
In addition, the Dragon's Heart has three optimized playing edges. Each of the three playing edges have been scientifically designed to cater to different picking styles.
- The primary lower edge offers the greatest balance between speed and attack.
- The sharp right upper lobe offers a very aggressive attack while maintaining speed and consistency.
- The rounded left upper lobe was designed with fast strumming and harmonics in mind.
Development
Material Science
The Core of the Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks
Hundreds of different material variations were considered in the development of The Dragon's Heart Guitar Pick. Properties such as friction coefficient, erosion resistance, tensile strength, flexibility and production process requirements were evaluated. Some of the materials include polyoxymethylene, polymethyl methacrylate, chlorinated polyvinyl chloride, polyvinyl chloride, polyether ether ketone, low-density polyethylene, high-density polyethylene, aliphatic polyamides, polyimides, molybdenum disulphide filled polyamide, phenol formaldehyde, polypropylene, polyurethane, polytetrafluoroethylene, polyphenylene sulfide compounds, nitrocellulose compounds, polyamide-imide, ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene, polyetherimide and many variations of these types of materials. In the end, polyamide-imide, or PAI for short, was clearly the best all around core material for optimum performance.
Some of the original material stock.
Injection mold machine.
The precision mold.
Application Science
Evaluation and Testing
63 different picks were evaluated - selected from the most popular styles and those used by top artists in the industry.
Though a subjective analysis was part of this process, each pick was precision measured for string displacement, curve radii, attack angles, return stroke distance and continuous stroke distance; relative to various grip placements and playing styles.
After many stages of evolution, the optimal design was precision blueprinted for injection-mold production. Though all of our prototypes were initially made by hand, the Dragon's Heart Guitar Pick is now precision manufactured via injection molding in Chicago Illinois.
During laser etching
Manufacturing
The amazing machines you see above and below produce the Dragon's Heart Guitar Pick quickly and efficiently at much lower cost than machining them by hand. This allows us to offer these high grade picks at a better value and in larger quantities while still keep true to Corey's fantastic design.
Once the Dragon's Heart Guitar Picks are molded, they moved immediately to an industrial oven where they are cured for 19 days. This ensures maximum longevity of the material.
The laser etcher.
After the curing process, our picks are tumbled to ensure maximum lubricity. Finally, the C. Whitney Guitars logo is laser etched into the surface of the pick. While this last step may seem like a bit of overkill, it ensures that the Dragon logo will last as long as the pick does. Every step of our process has been scrutinized to be certain that the highest standards of quality are maintained.