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Old 08-17-2010, 10:48 PM
alohachris alohachris is offline
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Join Date: May 2008
Location: Honolulu
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Default Take Your Cues From The Classical Guys

Aloha,

To optimize the sound & durability of an acoustic guitar, some of the historical work & choices have already been done for us. The best classical guitars in history -AND ALL CLASSICAL INSTRUMENTS OF THE VIOL FAMILY - ALL have ebony fingerboards.

And as anyone who has done lots of fretwork in their day can tell you: ebony is less porous, much harder, more durable and wear-resistant than rosewood of any species. Sure, it can be boring for esthetics, but it works better.

Historically, steel-string guitar factories liked to match up the fretboard and bridge woods on guitars. But it has nothing to do with sound or durability, just esthetics.

I'd say that in my repair and fretwork, that 85% of the fretboards with the worst "valley & gouge" type of groove wear and damage are made from rosewood.

For that reason, I take my cue from the great classical luthiers and usually use Gabon ebony fingerboards and Brazilian Rosewood for bridges (like Tippin & Somogyi do today mostly) on my instruments. My rationale is: If it's good enough for the best individual luthiers in history, then it's good enough for me.

To each his own. But there are historical reasons for choosing ebony over rosewoods or others for fingerboards.

alohachris
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