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Favorite tonewood?


billybilly

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I'm partial to alder for Strats and straight mahogany for hums. But I have all types and enjoy all types. Currently without any basswood and swamp ash. I've had three guitars made of swamp ash and they were all amazing in the sound department - just a few niggling complaints in other areas, hence no longer with me. May never find another one I can afford though as swamp ash seems to be going through the roof.

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My favorite semi hollow guitar at the moment is made of antique woods. Solid walnut top, Rosewood back and maple sides. I had a guy offer me $1200 for it and turned him down. I'll never be able to build another like it and have it sound the same.

 

Finding 200 year old Walnut and Rosewood like that just isn't going to happen for me. When wood gets that old its dam near petrified. I burnt a Dremil out completely just cutting the pickup holes. Most of that was just burning through the wood because the router bits went dull so quick.

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Its a hard dense wood, harder then Mahogany. Its is easily chipped like ebony. Its tone is much brighter then you'd think. It produces both a deep bass tones, bright upper mids and snappy highs. It doesn't do as well with the lower mids compared to maple or mahogany so its not everyone's cup of tea. Using a tele neck was a wise choice for me. Beautiful wood though. It was always one of my favorites for looks.

 

George Harrison used a walnut Tele. His slide tones were unique because of that. Mind has a good deal of those same kinds of tones, but its also a semi so its a bit thinner sounding wood wise. The mini HB's provide enough beef however.

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Actually the wood doesnt seem to matter especially with lots of distortion and lots of midrange and treble in the EQ. But if i had to settle for one particular wood for 1 guitar it would be alder. It's very versatile. i like the alder body, maple neck paired with a rosewood fretboard sound.

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^^^ I have a short scale Gretch bass with a plywood body. It sounds terrific compared to many other solid bodies.

The neck is solid however and the neck accounts for 50% of the string vibration, at least till you get to the highest frets where the neck connects to the body.

 

The quality of the plywood does matter allot. The stuff used for building instruments isn't the same stuff you'd use for building houses which is loaded with air gaps and inconsistent grains/layers. Plywood is graded just like other woods. The stuff used for musical instruments will likely have a high quality laminated veneer exteriors.

 

Plywood-300x231.jpg

 

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