australian woods for bridges

[reeves]

Dear all, i am wondering about using Australian woods to replace the ebony or rosewood often used in bridges for acoustic guitars. I have seen various types used such as casurina, blackwood, mulga, gidgee, myrtle or rose mahogany, Beefwood, minnerachi, wandoo or other desert woods such as boree, lancewood, they may have a similar consistency to the traditional woods.


I was wondering if anyone here has any first hand experience with this and how any alternative bridge woods will stack up in terms of stength , resonance and ability to transmit vibration efficiently to the soundboard.


Blackwood would seem to be a good alternative but for some reason doesn't seem to be used much in bridges, even by Maton or Cole Clark who use a lot of aussie woods for the rest of a guitar.

Aussie tonewoods (http://www.australiantonewoods.com/prod03.htm) has a good selection but i am looking for info on how the various options work and sound in realtime.

thanks john

[bitingmidge]

Sorry, I can't shed any light, but you might find something in Peter Coombe's wirting here:

http://www.petercoombe.com/publications.html

It's worth a read anyway!

cheers,

P

[kiwigeo]

John,

Drop Tim Spittle an email at Aussie Tonewoods and Im sure hell be able to fill you in on acoustic properties of the woods he stocks...hes a luthier as well as wood supplier.

Cheers Martin

[reeves]

thanks for the responses guys, i have read and saved peter coombes article before, good info but not much about bridge woods. I have emailed Tim spittles will post any response here..

thanks
john