Thread: Aussie wood for electric guitars

Originally Posted by Slapfest

The quality of the wood is the voice of the instrument.
If what you say is true (and it isnt)... why bother having a body at all?

The type and quality of the wood is a minor part of the voice of a solid body electric instrument. The electrics play a far more dominant role.

If the wood is the main control on the voice of an instrument then why does a Fender Strat fitted with Gibson pickups no longer sound like a Fender Strat??

Originally Posted by silentC

The body is only there to hold the bridge and the electronics; and the neck, well it would be hard to play without frets I suppose. But yeah the sound, well it suited the era I guess.

For what it's worth, I'm a bit on your side of the debate because I reckon the timber has at least some affect on vibration and sustain, which you would think has to leave some sort of fingerprint in the movement of the strings across the pick ups. But then I'm only a dddddrummer, so what do I know?

I know I built an electric guitar once, with an ash body and a Queensland maple neck. I spent a bit of money on the pick ups but it still sounded like crap

Fair enough . .

You shoulda said you were a drummer, I woulda gone easy on you . . lol

sorry

as for your ash/maple guitar . . . the combination should have worked, in theory (Vic. ash or american? . . both are good)
If its an electric, maybe look at the neck join . . hard to say
One of the ideas behind the tiny headstock on the parker fly was that they found by experimenting, that leass wood at that end of the neck, gave greater sustain, so perhaps if youve left a lot of wood on it, it maybe a bit of a tone-sync.
But certainly nothing wrong with yur choice of woodsd, a pity it wasnt what you wanted

It was Vic Ash. It was a long time ago (I was 18) and I put it down to poor implementation. Don't know where it is now, I lost interest in playing guitar when I discovered it involved practice.

Originally Posted by kiwigeo

The type and quality of the wood is a minor part of the voice of a solid body electric instrument. The electrics play a far more dominant role.

If the wood is the main control on the voice of an instrument then why does a Fender Strat fitted with Gibson pickups no longer sound like a Fender Strat??

Lets turn that around . . why does a Les Paul with strat pickups NOT sound like a strat?
Because of many things in the design difference, really . . and one of those is wood.
I already mentioned the alder body stingray vs the ash bodied one.
Thats the reason why builders that are after a "tribute" instrument quite often use the same woods as the original they are imitating..... so that the tone is the same, or similar.

And i said the wood was the main voice, not EVERYTHING.
Of course quality is important at all levels, and the choices of hardware drastically affect the tone the instrument is able to produce.

But that is AFTER the fact . . . how well the string rings, and the tone and sustain of that note (unless at high volumes, of course) . . cannot be altered by pickups or electronics . . . they can change the sound, yes . . but they cant make the string ring longer and fuller, with richer tone . . impossible.
Anyway, dont want to rpt myself

Originally Posted by Slapfest

Lets turn that around . . why does a Les Paul with strat pickups NOT sound like a strat?
Because of many things in the design difference, really . . and one of those is wood.

The Les Paul has a chambered body doesn't it? Once we get into a pseudo acoustic situation with a top acting like a soundboard the equation changes. The way a thin piece of wood like the top of a Les Paul behaves is not the same as the way the thick slab of wood that makes up the body of a solid body electric does.

IMHO, one major difference between Strats and Les Pauls that has a control on the sound of the instrument and is often neglected is the different scale lengths used in each instrument.

To clarify here is my take on wood and the sound of electric guitars:

1. Pickups and associated electronics (including amps/speakers) exert more of a control on sound of the instrument than choice of woods.
2. The choice of woods for the neck of the instrument exert more control over the sound of the instrument than choice of wood for the body. The primary effect of different wood choices for the neck is on sustain and this is controlled by the density of the wood used.

Cheers Martin

Originally Posted by Slapfest

For the life of me, i just cant figure out why theyre still making them out of wood, if it dont matter.

People like wood...its pretty and theyre used to guitars being made out of wood. Its like corks in wine.....the Stelvin seal is a much better way to seal up a bottle of wine but people are just used to cork.

Wood is still relatively cheap compared to carbon fibre and other alternatives. With time of course that will change as tonewood quality wood gets totally milled out.

Well said Martin you just can not beat good looking wood.
As for your comment wood is cheap compared to carbon fibre with time this will of course change as tonewood quality wood gets milled out, if forests are logged correctly that is selective logging practise we will never run out and I know I will never run out.
Cheers, Bob

Originally Posted by kiwigeo

The Les Paul has a chambered body doesn't it? Once we get into a pseudo acoustic situation with a top acting like a soundboard the equation changes. The way a thin piece of wood like the top of a Les Paul behaves is not the same as the way the thick slab of wood that makes up the body of a solid body electric does.

IMHO, one major difference between Strats and Les Pauls that has a control on the sound of the instrument and is often neglected is the different scale lengths used in each instrument.

To clarify here is my take on wood and the sound of electric guitars:

1. Pickups and associated electronics (including amps/speakers) exert more of a control on sound of the instrument than choice of woods.
2. The choice of woods for the neck of the instrument exert more control over the sound of the instrument than choice of wood for the body. The primary effect of different wood choices for the neck is on sustain and this is controlled by the density of the wood used.

Cheers Martin

Nexst time yoiu see a les paul . . pick it ujp . .
The chambers have no effect on the sound and are to reduce weight, and adjusst balance.
I know a builder that specialises in placing many diiferent sized chambers inside the instruments he builds, purely to adjust the weight, but NOT rersonate acoustically in any way.
They are just simply not acoustic by any shade of the imagination.
And to say that we use wood because we do, is specious at least.
Very chicken and egg.....

If we had something better, we'd be using it

Originally Posted by Slapfest

Nexst time yoiu see a les paul . . pick it ujp . .
The chambers have no effect on the sound and are to reduce weight, and adjusst balance.

The guys at Gibson would beg to differ. Here's an interesting read from the Gibson website:

Chambering the Les Paul: A Marriage of Weight and Tone

Originally Posted by kiwigeo

The guys at Gibson would beg to differ. Here's an interesting read from the Gibson website:

Chambering the Les Paul: A Marriage of Weight and Tone

given the thickness of the top of those guitars, I would say it would be quite a stretch to say they act the same as an acoustic top. They are still quite considerably stiffer than a <3mm thick acoustic top.

You also have to add the fact that the central part of the guitar is a thick hunk of wood, and and sides a quite thick... So I would say any difference in tone has to do with some other phenomena rather than the same things that govern acoustics.

In reality it is a moot argument, some shall say that the wood makes a massive differences, and others would say that a plywood guitar sounds just as good. It is personal preference.

I would say that if anyone says that wood makes no difference, then they are just plain wrong. The question is the matter of the degree of difference it makes.

And with electrics there are just so many variables that it is impossible to really single things down.

Heck you may find the biggest difference is actually governed by where the wire is sourced to make the pickups, or what sort of plastic is used... no one will ever really know... To hard to single out.

Originally Posted by malexthekid

I would say that if anyone says that wood makes no difference, then they are just plain wrong. The question is the matter of the degree of difference it makes.

I agree with this.

I disagree with those that state that the wood exerts a stronger influence on sound of a solid body than the electrics. The only part of the guitar where the influence of wood choice is perhaps more significant than hardware choice is the neck and here the critical wood property is density and the affect is on sustain. This is probably the reasons Ive always liked the sound of neck through guitars and particularly basses.

My electric customer builders always tell me the neck is the critical part of there build and want a dense neck, but they also want a nice body blank.
Cheers, Bob

Originally Posted by kiwigeo

I agree with this.

I disagree with those that state that the wood exerts a stronger influence on sound of a solid body than the electrics. The only part of the guitar where the influence of wood choice is perhaps more significant than hardware choice is the neck and here the critical wood property is density and the affect is on sustain. This is probably the reasons Ive always liked the sound of neck through guitars and particularly basses.

Originally Posted by Slapfest

One of the ideas behind the tiny headstock on the parker fly was that they found by experimenting, that leass wood at that end of the neck, gave greater sustain, so perhaps if youve left a lot of wood on it, it maybe a bit of a tone-sync.

G'day Slapfest, I have recently been reading as much as I can find about Ken Parker, his designs and why he uses certain design features. Can you point me to where Ken speaks about decreasing his headstock weight to increase sustain please?

Jim

Originally Posted by toejam

G'day Slapfest, I have recently been reading as much as I can find about Ken Parker, his designs and why he uses certain design features. Can you point me to where Ken speaks about decreasing his headstock weight to increase sustain please?

Jim

Less energy spent moving the headstock means more energy left in the strings?

You can experiment with this one yourself by clamping a medium sized G clamp to the headstock of your guitar and noting the change in sustain.