Favorite woods......

fazool · #1 11-23-2016, 01:00 PM

Well, just a rambling musing for no reason:

As a top wood, I love cedar the best. I love the chorus-like responsiveness and its delicacy. I love the appearance and the scent. I hate working with it, however. It's very unforgiving. I actually once put a gouge into a soundboard with my fingernail just because it's so soft.

I love the appearance of maple, especially with white binding but I am not a fan of the "brittle" maple sound.

I love the sound of rosewood. Scooped mids are my favorite EQ effect - I run my audio systems like that.

My favorite wood to work with is mahogany. I love the incredible airy lightness of it. Probably the most impressive wood to me. Not my favorite sound but a good second or third. Quilted maple is one of my favorite styles.

funkymonk#9 · #2 11-23-2016, 08:20 PM

Port Orford Cedar- Great soundboard substitute and i can smell it all day.

Rodger Knox · #3 11-24-2016, 12:13 PM

Blood wood is. a love\hate relationship. I love the way it looks, and the way it smells when being resawn, but it is hard to bend, and it bleeds on everything.

Bruce Sexauer · #4 11-25-2016, 10:21 AM

There was a time when Brazilian Rosewood was the smell of my dreams, but as I've aged I find it less interesting, especially as compared to the smell of D. Tucurensis. Tuc is much spicier, and I wonder if it might not even enhance pumpkin pie . . . Yum.

Bill Kraus · #5 11-26-2016, 05:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bruce Sexauer

There was a time when Brazilian Rosewood was the smell of my dreams, but as I've aged I find it less interesting, especially as compared to the smell of D. Tucurensis. Tuc is much spicier, and I wonder if it might not even enhance pumpkin pie . . . Yum.

Brazilian is still the smell of my dreams Bruce, mainly because I don't have enough. Regarding the Tuc., sprinkle a bit of fine dust on your pie and let us know how it tastes, but I recommend making a note of any effects on you're intestinal tract. It may enhance a nice chai tea also!

redir · #6 11-26-2016, 06:32 PM

I built about 25 guitars out of Imbuia... I really like the stuff but I also got a huge stash of it for free. I've been working with white oak lately and I really really like it too.

I have also been collecting Wenge. Even though I have yet to use it for some reason I really like it. The tap tone is phenomenal.

I can't say I have a favorite top wood because I like it all.

joinercape · #7 11-28-2016, 04:39 AM

Back in the late 1990's I built a half dozen or so classical guitars with black locust backs and sides. The wood was local, taken from a huge tree blown down in Hurricane Bob (early '90s), then sawn up by Tom Bednark (luthier as well as owner of Barnstable Bats). He showed it to me while I was buying some rosewood and Spanish cyprus from him, and I was intrigued by it's rosy yellow color and amazing tap tones. It was fairly easy to bend, took the gluing and finish well, and sounded really good. I wish I had more of it.
My other favorite is back and sides from Spanish cyprus, I love the soft creamy look and feel, and the mild smell which you can still perceive twenty years later.
I love working with mahogany, but after 40+ years using it in the cabinet and millwork business, I can do without the dust.
I agree about Brazilian rosewood, I was lucky to have built a few guitars from it years ago, but the cost and environmental issues make it prohibitive now.

LouieAtienza · #8 11-29-2016, 09:41 PM

I love the look and sound of vermillion (padouk) and I absolutely love the scent when cut, but it makes me sneeze like crazy and no matter how good my dust collection, everything seems to be coated in orange dust...

I also love the sound and look of plain ol' Indian rosewood - plentiful enough, dead straight quartered, nice chocolatey color, great sound, easy to work and bend...

For tops, I always love cedar - the way it looks, it's lightness of weight, quickness of response...

redir - I can't say I like the way wenge smells. Pretty bad really. I found it bends relatively easily, considering how brittle it can be.

Peter D. · #9 12-10-2016, 03:32 PM

Has anyone out there had the good fortune (because that's exactly what it takes to afford it) to build with Quilted Mahogany? I hear it sounds like nothing else on earth!

fazool · #10 12-10-2016, 04:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter D.

Has anyone out there had the good fortune (because that's exactly what it takes to afford it) to build with Quilted Mahogany? I hear it sounds like nothing else on earth!

I heard it sounds exactly like mahogany. It simply looks prettier.

joinercape · #11 12-10-2016, 07:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fazool

I heard it sounds exactly like mahogany. It simply looks prettier.

This ^^^ And a bit more trouble to work with IMHE

H165 · #12 12-10-2016, 09:38 PM

Quote:

I have also been collecting Wenge. Even though I have yet to use it for some reason I really like it. The tap tone is phenomenal.

As noted above, this stuff is brittle. I am fortunate to have tools as sharp a razors. Wenge tends to produce ultra-nasty edge splinters if your tools aren't right there, or you bend it a little off-temperature, or your bending curves are the least bit faceted. I think Wenge would be an absolutely super resophonic body wood, but I haven't yet put it on the bench to give it a try. Thing would probably weigh 50 pounds....

Truckjohn · #13 12-10-2016, 10:37 PM

I love the way mahogany, cherry, and walnut works, behaves, and looks. Hard wood is just supposed to have the nice beautiful brown color.... This stuff is just everything good about wood.

Lyptus eucalyptus and sheoak - great too.

I love the way oak bends, looks, and sounds... But it's a pain in the neck to finish all those bottomless pores. I probably won't use it for a neck again because it's heavy, stiff, and hard to carve - but it's great otherwise.

I thought I disliked Sapele until I got it to bend.... Now I like it too.

So far, I haven't really found wood I don't like... Yet.

Thanks

fazool · #14 12-13-2016, 11:30 PM

My least favorite are ovangkol and sapele. I am OK with sapele bodies but I don't like them on soundboards and the zebra striping really turns me off.

Funny enough, my GA3-12 gas a sapele body and it's indescribably beautiful. I must have got lucky with that guitar, overall, because the spruce soundboard has gorgeous bearclaw and the back has this magical chatoyance that pictures can't capture.....simply intoxicating to look at.

mb propsom · #15 12-14-2016, 09:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter D.

Has anyone out there had the good fortune (because that's exactly what it takes to afford it) to build with Quilted Mahogany? I hear it sounds like nothing else on earth!

I have to agree with fazool on this one. I've found that back and side woods make a minor (in certain cases noticeable) contribution to the overall tonal personality of a guitar. In my building experience, the difference between quilted mahogany, regular mahogany, quilted sapele and q/s 'ribbon' sapele guitars of the same model is negligible. Your choice of topwood is the primary determinant of a guitar's tone; that and the bracing scheme and body style. In fact, I've found that the variation in physical characteristics--i.e. stiffness, density, etc) in tops of the same species yields more tonal variation in guitars than does the choice of the aforementioned b&s woods.

That said, however, denser, harder back and side woods, like the ebonies provide a much different reflective surface and will give you a noticeably different sound from the mahogany and mahogany-type woods.

All that said, as far as top woods, I love Port Orford, sitka and more recently some beautiful Carpathian spruce. And as far as back and sides, I generally yield to the customer's preferences, but I've never been disappointed by EIR, Padauk (despite its miserable crater-like pores) and any of the mahogany/sapele gang.