Woods

[shredmonster]

Re: Woods

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BASSwood. Pronounced like the fish, bass. Rhymes with ass, lass, sass, mass, crass, grass, and pass.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry - not a nature kind of guy!

Anyway, the best sounding woods I have experienced has been mohagany with a maple top as some others have posted here.

Shur claims basswood (SEE IS SPELLED IT CORRECTLY) with a maple top could be the "holly grail" of tone.

[Firebird V]

Re: Woods

I personally like Mahogany. I would try to go with Korina. It is extremely resonant. Big tone. I love korina and snap up all the guitars I can find made with it. my all time favorite tone wood. Alder is plentiful. It is used for that reason. It sounds good too but it is easily found and that makes it cost effective.

[Firebird V]

Re: Woods

I just want to add that by plentiful I mean that it is readily available to use for guitar bodies. Korina is plentiful but it isn't really used for anything other than guitars because of its tonal characteristics. By this I mean that guitar builders are really the only ones looking for Korina and it isn't really imported in huge quantities like standard mahogany. That is what makes it so hard to find. Not because it is endangered which is what most people think. If I were going to have a guitar made out of mahogany I would have it made out of the white Korina species.

Most people using mahogany are building furniture with it so they dont care about how it sounds. So any mahogany will do so they go for the standard variety.

[Number Of The Priest]

Re: Woods

Anybody ever visit friends or family and see their beautiful wood furniture and think to themselves that it could have gone into making a great-looking guitar? [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] Or is that just me and my weirdness again? [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

[GodOfRhythm]

Re: Woods

[ QUOTE ]
Anybody ever visit friends or family and see their beautiful wood furniture and think to themselves that it could have gone into making a great-looking guitar? [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img] Or is that just me and my weirdness again? [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

I saw an interview with one of our Ministers yesterday, and he had this stunning mahogany/walnut cabinet with what seemed to be maple or something very pale as a means of stroke around all the lids, etc.

I thought, G'damm! That could have been a nice explorer!

[nix]

Re: Woods

You folks might find the video "Making an Archtop Guitar" by Bob Benedetto quite interesting. He addresses this subject in the context of making acoustic jazz guitars. He shows his methods of tapping his expensive tonewoods to find ones that will be suitable. The funny thing is that he says the use of specific woods is, to a great degree, driven by what cutomers perceive as good which is not always reality.
He then brings out an archtop made out of pine with all knots and imperfections and says that particular guitar sounds as good or better than some $20-$30k guitars using premium materials.
Me, I know what sounds good to my ears when I hear it but if blindfolded I don't think I could tell the difference in wood.

[Dreamland_Rebel]

Re: Woods

i see someone mentioned they had a mohagany RR.

standard productions RR's are made of alder. so if you do try out one at the music store - it will be alder.

body woods:
USA fenders - mostly alder and swamp ash
mexican fenders - mostly poplar - some alder
low end jacksons - some basswood - some alder
top end - mostly alder
ibanez - mostly basswood - newer models are coming in mohagany which is cool
fernandez - mostly alder and some mohagany
gibson - mostly mohagany - some korina (all les pauls will have a maple cap except for the studio models.)
this is just in general.

[jazzman]

Re: Woods

I seem to like alder best. I like mohagany too, but not as much although LP's sound big, fat, and heavy. Wait, they are big, fat, and heavy. I guess I'm a strat guy. But, I should have at least one Paul around. Maybe I'll get one. Only problem is every time I say that, I end up with another strat style guitar.

[shredmonster]

Re: Woods

I don't understand how someone could be of the opinion that your fingers are ALL you need for tone.

Come on... really.

Why don't all the builders use just plywood then.

As a musician or artist or tradesman or whatever - don't you want the best possible tools for whatever you do? To maximize whatever it is you are doing?

I think people go off on a tangent. Yeah everyone will sound like themselves no matter what guitar they play but that is not the topic. That is off topic.

The topic is differences in sound due to materials and design.

Guitars sound different. Period. It is due to a lot of factors but take playing style out of it. That is not what we are talking about here.

We are isolating a single topic here and the topic is wood.
And different woods sound different. To say that no 2 pieces of the same wood sound the same is also getting off topic.

Lets be intellectually honest. What is the big deal that people have to go into a rant about nothing has to do with anything, all you need is a piece of dung with strings and blah blah blah blah.

Woods have different physical charactoristics resulting in different sound charactoristics. Its a fact period.

There is nothing wrong with someone wanting to find the best wood combination to put together to make the best tool that they can to maximize their sound and tone.

I think to do any less is to not take your tone seriously which is fine also.

[xenophobe]

Re: Woods

I've always liked Mahogany... seems the guitars I've owned that I liked the tone best were Mahogany... my NAMM Archtop, my custom Warlock... both of which sounded awesome, but I couldn't be comfortable playing standing... the Archtop had too thick of a neck, and I couldn't get a comfortable position standing with my warlock.

I highly suspect that my custom Warrior has mahogany wings and neck, and my custom KV have mahogany wings and a maple neck (as it just sounds a bit brighter in the upper highs), but doesn't sound quite like the USA Selects I've played.

My choices for tonewoods are:

Mahogany
Koa
Korina

My next guitar will be Koa...

I had a chance to buy a 70's Carvin SG out of Koa for $400. I came by the next day to buy it and it had sold. Even with crap pickups, it still had a half decent tone and accoustically sounded awesome.

[shredmonster]

Re: Woods

Yeah I have often wondered about Zebra Wood and some of the other exotices.

Suhr is building one for Reb Beach these days made out of some very exotic stuff - Pau Ferro fretboard for example.

Ever listen carefully to Mark Knopflers tone?
I'm not talking about his playing here just his tone.
Its awsome for being so clean and unprocessed.
Its that guitar - its not effects.
Tone sounds so great. Its totally separate from playing ability.
Its another aspect to your sound and makes you stand out.

And yeah you do have to get it through your fingers as well but if you have a great toneful guitar it sounds twice as good.

[j2379]

Re: Woods

zebra wood is very heavy & sounds like crap too me. too bright lacks lowend but very focused if you like a very tight sound with alot of focus in the highs its cool. alot of exotics are more for looks than tone IMHO. like walnut the standard type walnuts sounds good, the heavier nicer looking Claro walnut is too heavy & bright sounding IMO & expensive. Koa is my favorite wood for guitars. all the warmth of mahogany but brighter & tighter sounding like maple. also ive found lighter weight flame/quilt maple sounds really good. alot different from tight straight grained maple which is alot brighter sounding. right now ive got a few maple, alder, mahogany, poplar & one koa guitar, & the koa is by far the most versatile & even sounding of them. When i brought a couple of guitars to Kev's "83SD" i think we were both surpised at the maple guitar were not as bright as expected compared to some alder bodied strat types.