Mahogany is usually dyed, right?

[Monsoon1]

nice examples in this thread. seems that a lot of light color woods would look decent with dye.

[TomB'sox]

Is there a reason we are saying "dyed" instead of stained? I have always thought of staining wood, I think of dye as something for clothes? What am I missing or are to the two terms interchangeable or does it indicate a different process?

[RP]

Originally Posted by TomB'sox

Is there a reason we are saying "dyed" instead of stained? I have always thought of staining wood, I think of dye as something for clothes? What am I missing or are to the two terms interchangeable or does it indicate a different process?

I would have said that the two are synonymous, but after doing a little digging http://www.woodworkweb.com/woodwork-...ning-wood.html learned that the two are very different. According to the above article, stain is oil-based and primarily lies on top of the wood with little penetration into the wood while dye is water-based and sinks into the wood and doesn't mask the grain. Thanks for the question - I learned something....

[TomB'sox]

Originally Posted by RP

I would have said that the two are synonymous, but after doing a little digging http://www.woodworkweb.com/woodwork-...ning-wood.html learned that the two are very different. According to the above article, stain is oil-based and primarily lies on top of the wood with little penetration into the wood while dye is water-based and sinks into the wood and doesn't mask the grain. Thanks for the question - I learned something....

Well, isn't that interesting! I learned something too. If I were to have guessed, I would have thought exactly the opposite of those two, ie. that the stain would penetrate more and not lie on surface. I know the luthiers discuss dyed maple for example when using color in a rosette for instance...makes sense now if they get color penetration all the way through the piece...

[T Texas]

Interesting....so are our mahogany guitars stained or dyed?

[Kerbie]

I'm not the expert, but I've always heard builders call it, "stained."

[Nctom]

I think Gibson always stained rather than dyed their mahogany. I'm not sure why, but the practice dates from early I their history and most other makers just followed their practice.
I have a J-35 and find the natural color refreshing. My mahogany Larrivees are also undyed/stained and look more "natural".

[TomB'sox]

This is why I brought up the question. I think the guitar woods are stained like most wood is, but the individual decorative pieces for say a stain glass rosette or headstock inlay are dyed???? That is my best guess and I am going with it hahah!!!

[Nctom]

I think Gibson and Martin stained rather than dyed their mahogany since early on in the industry, perhaps due to prevailing tastes or styles, and everyone else just followed them.
I have a Gibson J-35 and a couple of mahogany Larrivees and find the undyed/stained finishes more "natural".

Double Post

[redir]

Originally Posted by musicman1951

We have a long tradition of dying mahogany furniture red - we call it cherry, but it's usually considerably redder than actual cherry wood. I don't know why. Sometimes with cheaper furniture they did it to equalize the color when using cheaper cuts or another cheaper wood all together.

Maybe we stain guitars because we've reached the point where nobody would recognize the actual mahogany color.

That's a good point. It's kind of like how people view using whit oak on a guitar, it's a piece of furniture. Traditional furniture probably does influence our thoughts about guitars, everyone knows what an Amish oak chair or a Mahogany desk looks like.

The traditional pore fillers for mahogany were oil based paste fillers that colored the wood. That could be why mahogany is steeped in that tradition. Also as mahogany ages it gets red. I've got boards of mahogany that are 60 years old and when you cut them up and plane and sand them smooth the fresh faces are much lighter in color. So by staining it you get back to that old look.

[Ed-in-Ohio]

Originally Posted by TomB'sox

Is there a reason we are saying "dyed" instead of stained? I have always thought of staining wood, I think of dye as something for clothes? What am I missing or are to the two terms interchangeable or does it indicate a different process?

To complicate matters, StewMac's description of their ColorTone Liquid Stains includes a sentence that seems to indicate the two terms are synonymous:

"ColorTone liquid stains are lightfast metal-complex dyes that can be mixed for practically any desired intensity".

[Steadfastly]

I thought it was usually stained rather than dyed. Dyeing is supposed to bring out the grain better than stain.

[fitness1]

At any rate, I'll take mine au naturale.......

[DanleyJ]

Originally Posted by Wasper

I've even had two guitars of the same model have different stains. I bought one, but it had an issue and had to be returned. There were no more to be had in the country except the NAMM show guitar. So, they pulled it from the show and sent it to me.

First picture is of the guitar that was sent back. Second picture is of the guitar they replaced it with.

To be fair, the color balance of each photo is not a true representation. The first photo is probably pretty accurate. See the base board behind the guitar is white. In the second photo, there is an overall heavy yellow tint to the entire photo. Notice the wall and baseboards behind the guitar. Also most of what you see is a room reflection in the back of the guitar obscurring the actual wood grain of the guitar.

But, all this considered, there will always be different levels of stain in guitars unless they are stained the same day with the same batch of stain in the same spray booth.

I suspect the brownish red stain on most hog guitars may have been an attempt to make it look more like rosewood originally. But that's just a wild unsubstantiated guess on my part. I know Pono hog guitars are not stained and they have a really nice natural blondish strawberry red color to them. It is not mandatory to stain mahogany dark brown. It is just the standard practice by some manufacturers.

[Goat Mick]

Well whadda ya know. I learned something today. I always thought that mahogany was a naturally dark wood. But because that's how I've always seen it, that's the way I prefer it. Keep on staining and dying.