Yeh, but does it sound like a guitar made of wood???

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by EvanB

I've grown pretty defensive regarding my wooden guitars. After playing and hearing my CF guitars people often ask me why I bother having any dull sounding, inconsistent, fragile wooden guitars hanging around. I feel a bit of embarrassment but I fess up to just liking the historic aspect, sort of like owning a manual lawn mower.

You seem to have an unusual combination of high level of curiosity/willingness to experiment with new concepts and being careful selecting guitars to own. At least, those are impressions I have gotten from you over the years.

The only reasons I can think of to say about your wood guitars "dull sounding, inconsistent" is if the strings on them are old or they have been exposed to too much humidity for too long. I can't imagine either happening to your guitars. I can believe the "fragile" comment as being comparative to the nearly indestructible CF guitars in your collection, but that would then be said of all wood instruments.

I would say there is no need for any sort of embarrassment on your part at all.

Tony

[boneuphtoner]

Originally Posted by EvanB

I've grown pretty defensive regarding my wooden guitars. After playing and hearing my CF guitars people often ask me why I bother having any dull sounding, inconsistent, fragile wooden guitars hanging around. I feel a bit of embarrassment but I fess up to just liking the historic aspect, sort of like owning a manual lawn mower.

I’m exactly the same as you - I’m an old school guy in everything that I do - from the whiskey I like to drink, to the guns I like to shoot, to the strategy I like to employ in one of my favorite games, everything is old school. If CF guitars didn’t overwhelming work better for me than wood, I wouldn’t be playing one. I still have a solid top Martin X series guitar, and when I retire, I do expect I will find myself another wood guitar - just because I’m old school. I don’t see anything that Martin, Taylor or Gibson wooing me back in their direction anytime soon. Some of these Larrivee models look awfully intriguing even though I’ve never played one.

[David Eastwood]

To defend my defensiveness :

I’m not in the slightest bit defensive about my choice of guitars.

What I do get defensive about is the unjust maligning of CF as a material by people who don’t think about what they’re saying.

It’s really no different to the ‘dovetail neck joints sound better’ silliness (and that’s but one example) that pervades the wooden world.

Cheers!
David

[douglasfan1]

Originally Posted by RP

We sometimes hear or read the question in the title in reference to our carbon fiber guitars, but I really think that's the wrong question to ask. The better question, IMO, is "Do you like the tone of this or that guitar that's made from carbon fiber?" Let's face it, all wooden guitars do not have the same tone, and all guitars made from carbon fiber do not have the same tone. I realize it's darn near impossible to walk into a guitar store except maybe LA Guitar Sales and expect to audition a few carbon fiber guitars and compare them against each other, but that's the best way to see if one likes the tone of any particular cf guitar. I've owned several wooden guitars, and if my cf guitars sounded like them, you'd see a listing for them on Reverb...

All wood guitars may have different voicing, we still have expectation from the type of wood choosing from. For example, cedar usually provide warmer sound. Rosewood usually have the natural reverb bass, etc.

I do believe there should be some common sound characteristic with Carbon fiber. Usually people say that it's cold, attack are much faster with stronger fundamental tone... However, different construction make the sound completely different. Just like the bracing pattern of wooden guitars. It's not an easy task to come up with a conclusion without deep researches

In reality, I've tried journey OF 66 carbon fiber and my own Leviora CF guitar. They both sound very different (size matter too I believe). There are more review of comparison between Mcpherson CF and Emerald CF. It is not difficult to hear the difference between those two guitars. The difference should be more apparent when playing on hands.