Clapton's Guitar

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Dave Thompson

>If it were perfectly quatersawn, than you're right it doesn't make much sense, and it would be the edge. Perfectly quartersawn would be like taking a wheel spoke type cut (radii) out of the log. Ofcourse this would be incredibly wasteful and not too practical. I suspect it's not what the author is talking about.

One method for quatersawing is to quater the log, and then slice boards off the quarter. The first slices might be considered perfect or near perfectly quartered. As one gets further from the first slice, your quotation becomes true. The side closest to the bark is more quartered than the log interior side. The interior is more rift sawn.

By more quartered or more quartersawn, I mean the growth rings angle to the radii are more closer to perpendicular.

Easier with a picture, I'm sure.

Dave

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Moses Yoder in White Pigeon, MI

>I think what he is taking about is the radius of the growth rings. As you get nearer the center of the tree the radius of the growth ring would be smaller, making it less desirable / more prone to warpage or distortion. A quartered board or veneer would be sliced from the outside of the tree toward the center, and the wood towards the outside of the tree would be the most desirable.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>If you think of a violin top or back set, they are radial splits from a log, you get two adjascent pieces that are pie shaped, and they are joined along the bark edge of the pie split. This creates a plank that is higher in the middle allowing the distinctive violin shape to be carved out. Same with a guitar, the rings normally get finner out towards the "bark, of course we don't want the live wood, but the fine grain size from a few years back is probably at it's best.

One serendipitous thing is that a lot of trees have maybe a middle 6-8 inches of very fine grain (after being joined down the middle). Beuond that the grain often open up, and it is this area that can have the biggest impact where the open grian allows the hwole top to move.

On the other hand. Good wood by some measure of grain tightness or rarity, does not translate into the best wood for a given guitar. Historically great instruments are not notably good in the wood used. R Brunet wrote an article on what makes a good classical, the top ten list, wood isn't on it. Another famous builder, a super star Smallman, searches out bad wood because it is less stiff and more responsive. Of course in the folk trade, even to some extent the classical, a lot of the best guitars are electrified, and the wood is the least of your worries.

Even if one is looking for wood characteristics, species and measuring modulous of elasticity are more reliable than reading the grain. Fine grain does sell guitars, because it's easily quantified if the guitar has 50 lines to the inch, vs 25, though in make cases the 25 would be a better accoustic.

Get weighing and measuring deflection. Maybe that sounds over the top, but every archer who shoots wooden arrows does it (or buys it), yet luthiers were fairly unaware even 10 years ago.

Re: Clapton's Guitar *LINK*

wilbur

>Everything above is true. However, given that the thickness of an acoustic guitar top is only on the order of 0.1", I'm sure that as long as the original chunk of spruce was reasonably quartersawn, you could get the orientation of the grain in the finished top as perpendicular as you want.

By the way, here's a nice website that talks about grain characteristics and how it affects the sound of a guitar.


Wood grain and guitar sound

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>They may cut it so it riffs out, on purpose, since it's kinda desireable around the edges, where it runs into a "stone wall". The most obssessing is about fineness of grain, not so much direction since as you say the sawyer can control that.

Frank's a legendary repairman. Nice person, and a regular at seminars.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Dave Thompson

>The most obssessing is about fineness of grain, not so much direction since as you say the sawyer can control that

A local piano tuner was telling me he took a Steinway factory tour. Apparently they harvest all of their own wood from the north side of their own mountain so as to get the finest slow growth wood possible. Of course they do all of there own sawyering too.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>I've heard that too, about european spruce which is also pretty popular for guitars. Makes sense for the slower growth.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Are you saying that a log is quartered and then sawn more or less parallel to the bark?

Pam

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>That certainly makes some sense of it.

Thanks,

Pam

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Thanks, Thom, I understand this. I don't know enough to agree or disagree about tone woods vs junk, will keep it under advisement. I bought some air dried African Mahogany for the first try, but I'm really looking forward to using that black walnut for #2, a little personal test of "the type of wood doesn't matter" theory. I assume you're talking back and sides here, the sounding of the soundboard when braced does seem to matter. I'm also thinking of trying the Taylor method of sort of creasing the soundboard just inside where the kerfing is glued to facilitate movement.

Pam

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Thanks for the link, Wilbur, I learned a couple of things.

Pam

Who's Frank?

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>Wayne Henderson doesn't exactly say where he gets his red spruce, but he lives in southwestern Virginia (Rugby) and gets trees locally. I bet he's got a little north slope all to himself.

Pam

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Dave Thompson

>Are you saying that a log is quartered and then sawn more or less parallel to the bark?

Not quite. The log is quartered, and then slices are taken off parallel to the flat sides (not bark side). The first slices are quartersawn, but the interior starts drifting off to rift sawn.

OK, all is right with the world. :)

Pam Niedermayer - Austin, TX

>

Frank Ford, Frets.com

Bruce, a MN Galoot

>

Re: Clapton's Guitar

paul womack

>You need to make sure it's in the right direction, the way it came off the log. This side of the tree which is closer to the bark is more perfectly quartered than anywhere else."

This totally loses me. The side closest to the bark should be only the edge of a quarter sawn piece. Right? What's wrong with my picture?

I'm guessing what he means is that in a big log, the grain nearer the bark is more perfectly straight and perpendicular to the cut, since the radius is greater, and the curvature less.

In a diam->infinite log, a quarter slice near the bark would have perfectly perpendicular and straight growth rings.

BugBear

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>I was mostly responding to the idea, that's out there though not really as much in this thread, that expensive wood or ideal wood grain in the tops makes better guitars. If you were making airplane wings, or boat parts, good quality wood would mater, though testing would still be a best practice type thing.

Just as rosewood backs and sides generate big upcharges, so do really tight grained tops (to a lessor extent), on the basis that this more elite wood probably sounds better. My point is just that there isn't much evidence that is true. Afterall, even if the finer grained wood were stiffer, and even if stiffer were better, stiffness varies to the cube of top thickness so the skilled luthier would quickly get things back in ballance.

I haven't read the Brunnet article, but he is a fairly traditional luthier. I suppose if Tores got by with the wood available in a non- internet and HWY world (slim pickings) why not Brunnet. Smallman is the other extrem his lattice bracing with carbon is trying to get the centre of the guitar projecting as one so a soft top edge works like a speaker cone.

Wood type does seem to mater a lot, both for tone and projection. Between species there is a significant structural difference, for instance Sitka is strongest for weight, red cedar is lighter and softer. Redwood is light but sorta tinny stiff. These characteristics are in most wood cattalogs, and they do seem to hold up in practice. Woods also have characteristics that appear to be beyond the structural numbers a different ringing quality. Tapping is a good practice to get into at first it may not mean much but over time the input builds up. There is a lot of discussion about where the sounds come from do they come from particular areas on the top. in other words can one build the response to different pitches into the top. Probably the most splashy kind of thing there is the left right board where the bass side is cedar, and the trebble is spruce. Fun to play with if nothing else. In tops wood composites seem increasingly popular.

With bodies rosewood tends to project and sustain better, while lighter wood like mahog, and myrtle tend to deliver a punch for instance for flamenco. Black walnut is a nice wood I think I have played several, though not built any yet. I had a friend who used to build guitars in all kinds of weird woods he had sawn himself. You really can't see the grain in rosewood, so one can't evaluate it like softwood. No early and late wood.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>If it's actually quartered and not radial sawn, then grain distribution is not radial and can vary a lot, the inside edge is often riffed.

Also the outside edge is tighter grain lines. This is about a 1.5" square about halfway between the centerline and the edge. At the centerline the lines are about 32 to the inch. at the edge of the board there are bands of fine and coarse wood the latter being about 1/16". As pointed out it can be the variation that gives the top it's performance not the fact there is some tight grain there.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

wilbur

>I agree that the grain of the wood has minimal effect on the guitar's tone compared to the impact that changing the type of wood will have on tone. I think there are two areas where the grain becomes important. First is aesthetics, just like a table made of quartersawn mahogany will command a higher price than one made of flatsawn mahogany.

Probably more importantly, the grain might be important for structural integrity. Remember that a steel string guitar has over 100 lbs of tension on it at all times. In addition, the movement of the top and back of the guitar will be side to side, while the movement of the sides will be perpendicular to the top. The fact that many old guitars wind up failing at the seams speaks to this. If the grain of the top/sides/back is irregular or wide, those parts may move more than fine grained wood. So for longevity, fine grained wood would be more desirable, and should be reflected in the cost of the guitar.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

wilbur

>Most high end guitars have tops made by quartering the log, then splitting the quarter into thinner wedges, rather then sawing.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

Moses Yoder in White Pigeon, MI

>My wife's guitar is mahogany. I am tone deaf, so am not sure if the type of wood makes a difference, but I am pretty sure it does. One thing I know for a fact, it affects the price distinctly :) Mahogany makes a very nice guitar.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>Very good point. Classicals are normally mentioned at 100 pounds and SSs are nearer 200. Top wood though, is so over the top in quality it should never be a problem. As you say it's a big issue in terms of the life of the instrument, but all the wood is so over the top structural strength is not the biggest issue, though stiffness strength and tone march together.

If you look at grading rules it would run:

Worst to Best

Construnction grade. There are a lots of sub grades like stuff for walls, then trusses, then scaffolding, I really don't know how they work, but I know to look for them before I take a step. There is a grading authority.

Marine grade, 1-8 -1-16 runout. No grading authority today.

Ladder grade Seems to be better than the above but I don't know who does what

Aircraft 1-20 runout, graded, and tested in place. Wing spars will normally be tested to a multiple of G-force loading prior to certification.

Instument grade for tops and braces,usually zerroish runout, finest available grain, but since it's sawn one can't be as sure about top to bottom runout. No grading authority other than commercial.

Arrow stock, Less fine grain than best instrument. Arrows are graded for 1-12 runout, but in practice it's zerroish in POC, and it's zerro in both directions. There is an achery manufacturers association that sets standards. Material is graded to archer's size, release, and bow strength, power stroke pulse, and weight, through increasingly complex charts. Many archers have grain scales and less comonlly, spine testers. Most wood ends up smashed on rocks.

Not sure what that has to do with anything... Woods wonderful stuff.

Re: Clapton's Guitar

thomd

>"Most high end guitars have tops made by quartering the log, then splitting the quarter into thinner wedges, rather then sawing."

True of archtop guitars. I don't think it's true of flatop guitars. As far as i know people use horizontal band resaws. Grizzly tools started to stock them after their pres. got guitar fever. LMII has one, and some of the larger scale makers I know use them. Don't claim to know all the angles.