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  #16  
Old 10-02-2013, 10:39 AM
Pat Foster Pat Foster is offline
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In addition to what Charles Tauber wrote, I recall a time when the most plain, straight grain was desirable in all areas of woodworking, from yachts to furniture to guitars. You'll only find the most plain grain on vintage top-end six-figure guitars (topic for another discussion, to be sure) like 30s Martin 45s. My own take is that plain grain meant a sort of denial of the variability of natural materials at a time when plastics and other synthetics were becoming popular. Also, plain grain was and is the most rare and expensive. Synthetics on the other hand provided control over materials that we hadn't had before; we could then make plain, elegant objects whose visual simplicity was a way to show our ability to overcome the foibles of working with natural materials

Fast forward to today, when perhaps we've had our fill of the perfection we can attain with synthetics and technology, and we want to show off the beauty that nature can offer in the way of natural materials. With wood, what better way to do that than to use sapwood and wild grain?

Just my two cents.

Pat
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  #17  
Old 10-02-2013, 11:07 AM
Kent Chasson Kent Chasson is offline
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Originally Posted by Bob Womack View Post
Bob Taylor started discussing it around the year 2000, stating that certain types of wood were becoming more and more rare and the result was that smaller trees with more sapwood would have to be used for lower grades of instruments rather than discarded in order to get the sizes of pieces needed.

Bob
I think the issue of smaller trees certainly has something to do with it. But I also think it can be a nice looking detail. Kind of a lemons to lemonade thing. I personally prefer it in the middle and in small quantities but that's just me.

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  #18  
Old 10-02-2013, 11:13 AM
charles Tauber charles Tauber is offline
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Originally Posted by Pat Foster View Post
Fast forward to today, when perhaps we've had our fill of the perfection we can attain with synthetics and technology, and we want to show off the beauty that nature can offer in the way of natural materials. With wood, what better way to do that than to use sapwood and wild grain?
Seems like an insightful thought. Thanks for sharing it.
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  #19  
Old 10-02-2013, 11:22 AM
arie arie is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat Foster View Post
In addition to what Charles Tauber wrote, I recall a time when the most plain, straight grain was desirable in all areas of woodworking, from yachts to furniture to guitars. You'll only find the most plain grain on vintage top-end six-figure guitars (topic for another discussion, to be sure) like 30s Martin 45s. My own take is that plain grain meant a sort of denial of the variability of natural materials at a time when plastics and other synthetics were becoming popular. Also, plain grain was and is the most rare and expensive. Synthetics on the other hand provided control over materials that we hadn't had before; we could then make plain, elegant objects whose visual simplicity was a way to show our ability to overcome the foibles of working with natural materials

Fast forward to today, when perhaps we've had our fill of the perfection we can attain with synthetics and technology, and we want to show off the beauty that nature can offer in the way of natural materials. With wood, what better way to do that than to use sapwood and wild grain?

Just my two cents.

Pat
good point. but unfortunately it has to be understood as such. i have overheard buyers at guitar stores discussing the fact that "that crooked stripe down the middle" was a defect and one should stay away from it because it will "come apart" soon. and a satin finish "isn't buffed out enough", an open pore finish "will get dirty", you get the picture.
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  #20  
Old 10-02-2013, 12:02 PM
Alan Carruth Alan Carruth is offline
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There's a very good reason to avoid sap wood in boat building: it's far more prone to rot than heartwood.

Sapwood is the part of the tree that had living material in the cells when it was cut. As such it had 'active' ways of defending itself against the things that try to eat trees. When it is no longer possible for the tree to maintain that living material it floods the cells with 'extractives' that can act as passive defenses: fungicides, insecticides, herbicides, and things like silica that can slow down the bugs that try to eat it. These extractives are what give wood it's color. Some can be quite specific to certain types of threats. The 'spiderwebbing' that you see in many tropical woods doesn't follow the grain lines at all: it's made up of different sorts of things that the tree used to fight off various threats. I've seen a dark extractive line in a plank of BRW between the sapwood and a large grub hole. It's known that many plants emit pheremones that attract particular parasitic wasps when they are invaded by beetle grubs, for example. The wasps come in and take care of the problem, breeding new tree defenders in the process. Isn't nature grand (if you're not one of the grubs!)?

Until fairly recently you hardly ever saw tropical wood with the sapwood on it; they cut it off as soon as possible so that it would not harbor things that could eat into the tree. I suspect the fact that you see it now is a tribute to faster transportation: trucks rather than river drives.

When you did see sapwood on old tropical wood, it was almost always rotted in part, or wormy, and thus unsound. If it's not so damaged it's not all that much different from heartwood in it's properties, as I understand it.

Thus there's not a lot of reason to exclude sapwood from guitars, so long as it's not unsound. There's a long history of using sapwood decoratively in instruments: many lutes were made of 'shaded' yew: the sap/heart line went down the center of the ribs, making a back with alternating red and white stripes. Since the sapwood on yew is narrow the ribs were too, and I've seen these with 33 or more ribs making up the bowl. I was told recently that this was done originally to emulate the look of ivory and tortoise shell, but became a fashion in it's own right because of the tonal properties of the yew.
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  #21  
Old 10-02-2013, 12:36 PM
Pat Foster Pat Foster is offline
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I just remembered another reason: Some years ago a student here where I work had brought in his new luthier-built classical guitar. I don't remember what the back and side wood was, but it had sapwood in the center of the back, a bit less common in the classical world. He said the builder had told him the sapwood was included because it would break in according to how he played, as if the sapwood were somehow more sensitive. It was all I could do to keep from rolling my eyes and groaning.

Pat
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  #22  
Old 10-02-2013, 12:41 PM
dneal dneal is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat Foster View Post
In addition to what Charles Tauber wrote, I recall a time when the most plain, straight grain was desirable in all areas of woodworking, from yachts to furniture to guitars. You'll only find the most plain grain on vintage top-end six-figure guitars (topic for another discussion, to be sure) like 30s Martin 45s. My own take is that plain grain meant a sort of denial of the variability of natural materials at a time when plastics and other synthetics were becoming popular. Also, plain grain was and is the most rare and expensive. Synthetics on the other hand provided control over materials that we hadn't had before; we could then make plain, elegant objects whose visual simplicity was a way to show our ability to overcome the foibles of working with natural materials

Fast forward to today, when perhaps we've had our fill of the perfection we can attain with synthetics and technology, and we want to show off the beauty that nature can offer in the way of natural materials. With wood, what better way to do that than to use sapwood and wild grain?

Just my two cents.

Pat
Between this and the runout thread(s), this is the very thing I have been again pondering over the last few days. It doesn't seem that long ago that we only used select and better for shop class projects, but I now realize it's been over 30 years...

I'm active duty military and (again) stationed in Germany. Where furniture in the U.S. is mostly plywood and laminates (even in the higher end lines), "MassivHolz" (solid wood) furniture at reasonable prices is quite common in Germany and throughout Europe. Beech is the most common, followed closely by (white) oak. Knots are common, and acceptable. Initially, this seemed "wrong", and I would grade the wood as #1 common at best, and #2 common in most cases. "Select and better" isn't to be found. Germans in particular have "Wildeiche" ("Wild" Oak) as an option, and it has very uneven grain and a higher frequency (and size) of knots.

The wife and I have invested in a lot of furniture during this (and previous) tours, because it holds up to frequent moves and you only have to "buy it once". I have overcome the bias of what I would have found unacceptable at one time.

As you point out, abundance of inexpensive, select grades of wood is behind us. Our tastes are going to have to change. In general, I'm not a fan of sapwood, although there are tasteful applications (Kent Chasson's pics being a perfect example).
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  #23  
Old 10-04-2013, 02:27 PM
ahutt59 ahutt59 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by IndianHillMike View Post
Straight up aesthetic choice for me...



In this case I wanted the back to somewhat mimic a calla lily and the sapwood is a key part of that!

Mike
Holy awesome looking guitar Batman....

Wow is all I got!
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  #24  
Old 10-04-2013, 04:01 PM
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Tim McKnight Tim McKnight is offline
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Personally I like the use of interesting sapwood in the center seam as a focal highlight but I prefer very small and thin strips. It has to be even and uniform on both halves or it bugs me to no end.

I've built several guitars with Shag Bark Hickory with extremely wide strips of sapwood, oriented in the center, with no structural or tonal implications. At least Hickory sapwood is as hard and stable as the heartwood.

I have come across sapwood that has been spalted, insect eaten and punky in several species including Walnut, Mahogany, BRW, Cocobolo and Zircote. Therefore, each piece has to be closely examined for structural integrity and judged as a unique piece before considering it useful.
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