What do you consider to be the biggest myths and biggest truths about guitar construction?

[u6crash]

Been reading some stuff about soundwaves and guitar construction and have seen the discussions here for years. I've had the privilege to speak with a couple talented luthiers who have 20+ years in the business and even between the two of them opinions can vary wildly.

 

Some things I've heard from different folks here and there:

 

Maple is a bright sounding wood.

Mahagony is a warm sounding wood.

A fretboard that is too thick can take away from the tone of the guitar.

Neck through construction is the best way to build a guitar.

Lighter construction all around lends to a better tone.

Heavy construction adds to sustain.

Single piece bodies and/or necks lend to a better guitar.

Non wood materials (fiberglass, acrylic, steel, aluminum) do not sound as good as solid wood.

Bone is a superior nut material

Stainless steel frets make the sound brighter.

Truss rods detract from the tonal quality of the guitar.

 

Some of the things I tend to believe:

 

I think it might be true that sustain is increased if mass is added at the bridge and/or the bridge is anchored in a denser wood. We talk about vibrations going throughout the guitar, but the pickups are focused on the vibrations above them. If you want a note to sustain longer I feel that it stands to reason that keeping more of that vibration between the bridge and the nut (or fret) instead of passing it on through the neck and body is ideal. Conversely, on an acoustic I feel that you may want those vibrations being transferred to the top to increase the sound (but maybe this comes at a loss of sustain).

 

I feel that woods can have different tonal qualities, but on electric guitars I feel like it's the smallest part of the equation. Cheap plywood guitars may not sound as good solid wood guitars, but consider that those cheaper guitars will also have cheaper electronics, tuners, etc.

 

Scale length has an effect on tone. I could be wrong and it's not something I gave much thought to until I read something recently about humbuckers in Strats versus Les Pauls and how it's just not the same. Then I remembered the Jim Soloway built his guitars with a 27" scale and standard tuning for this reason.

 

I also believe there may be more myths than truths.

 

Some things that got me thinking about this:

Recently read a post elsewhere about a guy who recorded a blind video with seven different Gibson models. In a blind listening test no one could accurately match up the sounds to the models.

 

As I start to plan my first semi-hollow (or chambered) build, I'm wondering why I want to go that route. If I'm honest it's because 90% of it is that I think they look cool and 10% is because it will be a little bit louder if I choose to play it unplugged.

 

Some other things may come to mind. Hopefully we can keep it civil. Just want to add that the things I believe now may not be the truth. Some of these things would be testable without building a whole guitar. You could string up a single string at 24", 25.5", and 27" and tune it to pitch and compare. But so many of our comparisons are flawed because there are multiple factors going on between any two guitars that might seem similar (scale length, nut material, bridge, etc.).

 

[Grant Harding]

Artificially ageing a guitar makes it somehow cooler.

 

Set necks have more sustain.

 

Wood species makes more difference than the grade of the specific piece being used.

[Freeman Keller]

 

 

As I start to plan my first semi-hollow (or chambered) build, I'm wondering why I want to go that route. If I'm honest it's because 90% of it is that I think they look cool and 10% is because it will be a little bit louder if I choose to play it unplugged.

 

 

I'm not going to enter your discussion as its been done to death. One thing that is rather interesting is that I did build two (nearly) identical Les Paul style guitars. The have exactly the same body wood, neck wood, fretboards, hardware, scale length and importantly, pickups and electronics. One is a solid body with maple top, the other is chambered (I showed you the picture before) with a Spanish cedar top (which is a mahogany). So, yeah, they have two differences, but the density of maple and Spanish cedar are pretty close and they have similar sound dissipation speeds.

 

One guitar is considerably lighter than the other.

 

We sat down one night and played both of them thru the same amp, same settings, same pick, same player(s). More or less the same songs and riffs. We recorded them back to back (same recorder) and I posted the clips on this forum. Everyone agreed that they sounded different altho most people couldn't describe the sound (what is a "warm" tone?). Different people preferred one over the other.

 

 

So, my biggest truth about guitars - different guitars are different

 

My biggest myth about guitars - we know why

 

 

[soundcreation]

your number two is an interesting one.

 

The only near controlled study I saw...and I used to post it here often, but can't be bothered to dig it up now.....

 

showed that it's actually bolt on that produced the most sustain followed by set neck and neck through was last.

 

This was done using the same piece of wood, first as neck through then cutting the same piece for bolt and set.

 

Until I see a better experiment done I will believe what this test said.

[WRGKMC]

I'd have to question most of these.

 

Maple is a bright sounding wood. - I have a Rickenbacker and a Tele I built which have maple bodies and necks and they are much darker sounding then you'd suspect

 

Mahogany is a warm sounding wood. - Opposed to what?

 

A fretboard that is too thick can take away from the tone of the guitar. - The neck holds one end of the string and produces 50% of the tone. What's true for the body is true for the neck.

 

Neck through construction is the best way to build a guitar. - Best way to build or a preferred way to build?

 

Lighter construction all around lends to a better tone. - Acoustic tone? Possibly. Depends on the quality of the build materials used and the tones the player prefers.

 

Heavy construction adds to sustain. - Again. Allot of factors involved. Denser woods can compress the sound but much depends on amplification.

 

Single piece bodies and/or necks lend to a better guitar. - You essentially mentioned this already

 

Non wood materials (fiberglass, acrylic, steel, aluminum) do not sound as good as solid wood. - Unlikely you'd be able to identify the differences in a blind comparison.

 

Bone is a superior nut material - Its a preferred material by many, but superior?

 

Stainless steel frets make the sound brighter. - So turn your treble down

 

Truss rods detract from the tonal quality of the guitar. - When was the last time you played a guitar without a truss rod in order to make that judgment?

 

I can only name a few. Toy acoustics that warped up like a pretzel and sounded like garbage, an ovation with an aluminum fret board, a Bond guitar with a fret board made of bowling ball material, and a few Kramer's with aluminum necks.

 

vibrations going throughout the guitar, but the pickups are focused on the vibrations above them. If you want a note to sustain longer I feel that it stands to reason that keeping more of that vibration between the bridge and the nut (or fret) instead of passing it on through the neck and body is ideal.

 

Guess you don't know your physics very well. You seem to thing the bridge and nut only pass sound in one direction. Waves travel bi directionally through the bridge and nut faster then the speed of sound through the air. The wood colors the strings vibrations immediately after the initial attack as they pass through the body and neck back up into the strings. Most materials remove a fair amount of treble leaving the resonant frequencies of the body and neck. If you doubt this, simply place your ear directly against the body. The amount of resonance is much greater then you think.

 

Scale length has an effect on tone. I could be wrong and it's not something I gave much thought to until I read something recently about humbuckers in Strats versus Les Pauls and how it's just not the same.

 

An inch really doesn't make that big a difference. You may feel difference playing an instrument but again, in a blind listening comparison its unlikely you could tell scale length.

 

As I start to plan my first semi-hollow (or chambered) build, I'm wondering why I want to go that route. If I'm honest it's because 90% of it is that I think they look cool and 10% is because it will be a little bit louder if I choose to play it unplugged.

 

If you aren't sure then I advise against even beginning the project. Building an instrument requires a big investment in tools, skill material and allot of time. When you add all that in to what it takes to build a guitar, its easily double or triple the cost of just buying an instrument.

 

The chances of succeeding in a good semi-hollow build on the first attempt and having it match even a low end factory build are going to vary.

My father was a good carpenter and he taught me how to use the tools of the trade beginning when I was 5. I did all kinds of building work before I ever got around to building instruments and I can say many of my first attempts were major flops. Later when I worked in music stores and had a chance to work with some excellent Luthiers, my planning went better and my success rate improved. I've built at least 50 guitars, several of which were semi hollow bodies.

 

I don't build acoustic guitars however. I've done enough major repairs years and have the skill to build them but I don't have the passion needed to make the investments in the tools needed to do the work well.

 

If your goal is to simply the payoff of having a good instrument to play, there are much easier and less expensive ways of obtaining a good instrument.

 

If you have a passion learn and are focused on becoming a good craftsman first - then definitely go for it.

 

Its the passion that gets you through all the challenges and it takes hard work to incrementally developing skills over time. When you learn to love the process more then the outcome, you'll take fewer short cuts to obtain a finished result. Quality becomes as a series of small steps each requiring different distinct skills and planning which chain together to produce a good build. Even then it can be hard to predict exact results.

[u6crash]

Oh, you should question most of them. As I mentioned, they are not things I believe, but things I have heard repeatedly.

 

Mahogany is warm compared to what? I don't know. I think Freeman nailed that one. What is warm? If you said mahogany produces the most midrange frequencies of all the hardwoods, that would at least mean something.

 

I was thinking about the lighter construction build and I think it is something that is more true for acoustic guitars, but it must have diminishing returns. You wouldn't build a guitar with a mulberry paper back and top and expect it to have the best sound out there.

 

I've heard the truss rod detracting from tone from several people (thus they prefer smaller truss rods). However, I one of the luthiers I know with 20+ years prefers to build guitars without truss rods. He may use reinforcement carbon rods or wood strips or other things, but does not like to use an adjustable truss rod. This kind of construction is difficult as it often means he has to make serious adjustments to the neck several times along the way and it means that guitar is set up for one and only one gauge of strings. Needless to say, most of his clients want a truss rod because it's what we're used to. In classes that he teaches he passes around two necks, one with a truss rod and one without. Using a finger and striking the one without the truss rod gives a notiecable sound like a marimba, while the one with the truss rod kind of falls dead. Now this may not mean a lot, but you've already stated that the neck is responsible for 50% of the tone. This builder may or may not be right about the truss rod, but I'm still going to put on in my guitar neck.

 

When I spoke of the sustain I'm not speaking of the amount of resonance, but the duration. But you're right, I haven't had any formal physics education since high school nearly 20 years ago and we did not cover bi-directional soundwave speed.

 

I certainly could not tell the difference in a blind test on scale length. But that doesn't mean there aren't measuring instruments that could verify this or not. Here is the article that I read about it.

 

I've had "build a guitar" on my to-do list for over 15 years. I spent the last year and a half developing a screen printing studio in my basement. I enjoy taking on a challenge and learning new things.

[Freeman Keller]

OK, I realize that this is the electric forum and that neither U6 or WRG builds acoustic guitars. I don't even know if they play them. However one of the great truths in the acoustic guitar world is that the material that the nut and saddle is made out of has a significant affect on the sound - right? In fact many people think that the "best" material is the one you can't get - elephant ivory - and they will pay large sums of money for "legal" ivory (or fossilized or smuggled or whatever you want to call it). So here is an attempt to "prove" (or at least demonstrate) the differences

 

http://luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=48334

 

Before you read any of the discussion, listen to the clip and write down your impressions. Which nut/saddle material sounds "better" and if you are really gutsy, why?

 

Now read the discussion. Alan Carruth and David Collins are both highly respected voices in the lutherie world trying to understand why instruments sound the way they do. Carruth has applied a very systematic and scientific approach to the effects of different elements of acoustic guitars, Collins' work on debunking myths about electric guitar components is some of the best. Read their comments carefully. Now look at your preferences.

 

The end result of this is maybe you'll have a better understanding of just how difficult it is to tell whether any of the "truths" you hold so self evident are really true.

 

 

[garthman]

I think that pick-ups, caps, switches, cables, effects pedals and amplifiers are quite important. Wood can often be pretty.

 

. . . . Oh, and strings - they are quite important too.

[Grant Harding]

I was really surprised by my picks. I was way closer than I thought. I got 2 and 4 wrong, but was correct on 1,3,5.

[Grant Harding]

Yeah - there's obviously a lot of overlap. Lots of set necks have more sustain than lots of bolt-ons etc, but everything else being the same that's my experience.

[DeepEnd]

I remember a guy who posted a lot in Acoustic Guitars some years ago. He claimed to be a luthier and at one point he wrote about the profound--not just subtle--effect of headstock mass. I wonder why using a capo doesn't change the sound of my guitar other than shifting the pitch?

[Freeman Keller]

DE, I've already posted a link to this thread about our perceptions about the sound of things, but you might want to look at Al Carruth's comment on page 2 (third post down). I won't say I agree with it or not, but Al is one of the more highly though of people studying the effects of different parameters on guitar sound.

 

http://luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=48334&start=25

[Ratae Corieltauvorum]

The biggest myth is the Chinese can't make a guitar as good as an American maker

[DeepEnd]

It could very well be true. A local guitarist I know told me he swapped the tuners on a Guild D25 and it changed the sound. It probably did but whether the change was profound rather than subtle is debatable.

[u6crash]

OK' date=' I realize that this is the electric forum and that neither U6 or WRG builds acoustic guitars. I don't even know if they play them. [/quote']

 

For my part I actually play acoustic 98% of the time. I'd like to build one of those too someday, but I feel more daunted by that task.

 

Very interesting thread. As I was thinking more an more about this (and other experiments) I was thinking of all the variables you count for, but then how many do you not account for? You'd almost need a robot arm to apply consistent and even pressure in the exact place and use a new a pick each time, etc.

 

For myself I don't feel there are very many truths that I personally hold on to regarding guitar. I feel like a plastic nut may not be ideal. For some reason I feel like it would be bad to build a guitar entirely out of maple, but I doubt it is actually true and have no idea why I think it should be avoided.

[Phil O'Keefe]

One thing about nut material is that it's completely out of the tonal equation the second you fret a note as opposed to playing an open string. Saddle material, OTOH, is always in play. I can definitely hear a difference when switching from steel to brass saddles on a Telecaster.

 

My biggest concern with nuts is making sure they're cut right and that the string height is correct and the nut slots don't pinch or bind the string. Outside of that, I'm really not that picky about them.

[Freeman Keller]

 

For my part I actually play acoustic 98% of the time. I'd like to build one of those too someday, but I feel more daunted by that task.

 

Very interesting thread. As I was thinking more an more about this (and other experiments) I was thinking of all the variables you count for, but then how many do you not account for? You'd almost need a robot arm to apply consistent and even pressure in the exact place and use a new a pick each time, etc.

 

There has been an amazing amount of work done in the field of acoustic instruments trying to understand these variables. Here is a classical guitar under study - it is in a special chamber with sound absorbing walls, suspended on rubber bands so movement of the back isn't impeded by the player holding it. The bridge is being driven by a tiny transducer at selected frequencies (and the person presenting this acknowledges that the mass of the transducer affects the experiment. Sound distribution was recorded with lab quality mics and run thru FFT software. They actually used this to duplicate a wonderful sounding old guitar and to find and eliminate a wolf tone. The photo is from a 2008 GAL conference

 

 

I posted some stuff by Alan Carruth above - he has been instrumental in studying the way guitar tops vibrate (so called Chladni patterns)

 

http://www.alcarruthluthier.com/Downloads/Acoustic1.pdf

 

Al also has a clever way to "pluck" the guitar the same way using a small piece of magnet wire - wrap it around the string and pull, it will always break with the same force.

 

 

For myself I don't feel there are very many truths that I personally hold on to regarding guitar. I feel like a plastic nut may not be ideal. For some reason I feel like it would be bad to build a guitar entirely out of maple, but I doubt it is actually true and have no idea why I think it should be avoided.

 

As Phil and other have pointed out, once you fret a string the nut is out of the picture. Remember too that Tusq is a synthetic material - technically a "plastic". And while maple isn't normally used as a top wood it is on many Gibson ES style guitars (however of course it is laminated which throws an whole 'nother truth/myth into the picture)

 

My point is simply that there is a ton of research into your truths and myths, at least in the acoustic world. There has been some work done with electric guitars (one significant study that I've posted before about electronic components). The simple truth is that all guitars are the sum total of their parts and every part makes some contribution. Some are far more important than others.

[Bucksstudent]

Great thread! Love your posts, Freeman.

 

From my perspective, what affects my tone just as much as the build is my playing approach. I don't play acoustic the same way I play my Les Paul, but I also don't play a Strat the same way I play my Les Paul. They're different instruments.

 

But that's irrelevant. To my ears, mahogany and alder don't sound the same, but I've never played a mahogany Strat or an alder Les Paul.

[billybilly]

 

Where do you stand on zero frets?

The nut is right out of the sonic equation plus open and fretted noted sound the same.

Also gauge changes are easier because the nut is only keeping the string in line so the slots don't have to fit snug

I'll put my 2 cents in... I'm definitely for the height they offer on the nut space. So often, nuts are cut way too high which significantly effects the way a guitar feels and plays. I think I've lowered all my nuts.

 

I haven't owned a zero fret but would certainly like them I'm sure.

[WRGKMC]

Believe it or not sound does gets past a fretted string just like it gets past a TOM type bridge into the tail piece or the nut and tuning peg.

 

Is it allot? No. You can barely hear it at all if you have clean tone dialed up.

 

That's the thing about electrics however. You can gain them up so high just rubbing your hands on the body sounds like an elephant passing gas. These small leakages of vibration that make it past frets, bridges, nuts becomes insanely loud when you crank the gain way up and its what's responsible cranked and its part of where the electric magic comes from.

 

For some reason people things the vibrations stop dead at the nut and bridge. They don't. They are solids which conduct sound bi directionally very well, much better then air does. That vibration loops through the neck and body passing in multiple directions at the same time.

 

Its like throwing two stones in a lake. When the waves will meet they don't crash and die. They pass right on through each other as though they aren't even there unaffected by the other waves traveling in the opposite direction. This is what happens in a guitar except its all three dimensional. The waves travel in all directions, up down sideways forwards and backwards.

 

The body tone of the instrument is akin to how a wine class changes pitch when you add more liquids. Some woods have low density and have a higher resonant pitch like an empty wine glass. High Density woods generally have a lower resonance of a half or full wind glass.

 

The resonance of the body does not determine pitch however. This is where many people loose it. The strings are tuned to fixed pitches so those notes don't change. Strings produce multiple frequencies at a fixed all the time.

 

The analogy is this. If you have a grown man and a child sing the same note, the pitch is the same but the man having 3 times the lung size, and allot more body mass creates more bass frequencies then the child. The child produces more mids and highs because the lung resonance is pitched higher.

 

Wood resonance is the same thing here except you aren't dealing with solids not air chambers or liquids.

Woods are also more complex because the cells of the wood contain cells that become tiny air pockets that were once full or water/sap. As the wood ages these pockets dry out and harden. You also have the hard grain, the tree rings that separate these softer pockets into layers.

 

Its how close these hard layers are compared to the spongy wood between them that determines things like sustain and tone. Soft woods have more soft wood pulp between layers that deaden vibrations faster. They also absorb frequencies differently then hard woods

 

Wood tone is a matter of frequency filtering by the wood itself.

 

Different materials of different shapes, thicknesses and densities pass and absorb some frequencies better then others.

 

Its like listening to people behind a wall in the next room. If the wall is thick heavy, you may only hear the low bass frequencies. Lighter less dense materials may only knock off the top end.

 

Same thing with woods in an instrument. Some absorb more highs and pass lows very well so the instrument sounds dark. Some absorb lows very quickly and pass highs easily - you'd call those bright sounding woods.

 

Electric guitars have the added complexity of amplification however.

 

The pickups, amp and speaker etc. have EQing and gain effects on the tones the strings produce. They can boost or cut different frequencies depending on the choices involved. If the wood has a scooped bottom end you can boost the lows electronically to some extent.

 

It cant manufacture frequencies that don't exist any more then an EQ on a mic make someone with a rotten voice sound good. It can boost weak frequencies and attenuate strong ones to flatten the response out fairly well, leaving you with whatever tone is present from the instrument itself.

 

You can even install piezo saddles and preamp to get acoustic guitar type tone and string responses if you choose.

 

That's the beauty of the instrument. There are many ways to influence the sound before becomes an electric signal - alter it as an electrical signal form - then choose how you want it to be converted back to sound. (You can throw digitizing it in there too as many effects do use A/D - D/A conversions these days).

 

Every step of the entire chain has an influence from the player picking notes through the body, the pickups, the guitar cord,, the effects pedals, the amplification, the speakers, and the room reflections all have an impact. on the final tones you produce.

 

All combine to give you a sound and its up to the player to discover how they work for or against him.

Like the parts of a body the entire chain is important. You may not think a toe is a major part of being a complete human, but you loose one you will recognize it did have a big influence on your ability to walk.

[Phil O'Keefe]

 

Where do you stand on zero frets?

The nut is right out of the sonic equation plus open and fretted noted sound the same.

Also gauge changes are easier because the nut is only keeping the string in line so the slots don't have to fit snug

 

I don't hate them, but I don't go out of my way to find guitars with them either. There are far more important things to me that I look for, such as neck profile and feel.

[Phil O'Keefe]

Believe it or not sound does gets past a fretted string just like it gets past a TOM type bridge into the tail piece or the nut and tuning peg. It doesn't have allot of influence at low volumes but you gain a guitar up and you can clearly hear how those resonances affect the notes.

 

If you own a contact mic, you can easily clip it to the strings and amplify it.

 

For some reason people things the vibrations stop dead at the nut and bridge. They don't.

 

Of course they don't... but IMHO the nut has relatively little effect on the overall sound once you fret a note.

[Grant Harding]

If you put a mic 3 feet in front of the strings you'll also hear them.

[u6crash]

And while maple isn't normally used as a top wood it is on many Gibson ES style guitars (however of course it is laminated which throws an whole 'nother truth/myth into the picture)

 

The carved vs. laminate debate was one of the things I was reading prior to posting this thread. I find this stuff fascinating. I've saved that PDF for future reading. Glad to know there are efforts being made to test some of these myths/truths out. The more I think about it a lot of them could be tested without building full size/fretted guitars.

 

Hope I'm not opening too many cans of worms, it's just how my mind works. I do screen printing on the side and I currently undertaking a project to do a massive swatch books of different inks and different papers and combinations thereof.

 

Freeman, really enjoying your contributions here especially since you originally said you weren't going to comment on it.

[Ratae Corieltauvorum]

Phil, I don't know why, as my scientific head says your statement that a fretted note takes the nut of the equation, although I'd prefer to say a fingered note as I work on violins cellos, v**las and the odd double bass and as you know they are all traditionally ebony nut and maple bridges, but my gut instinct says that they can't be treated in isolation. The neck, incluidng shape design etc of the headstock, is the least understood and underestimated contributor to the tone of the instrument, both in materials of construction and attachment to the body.

 

I think it's about time I fronted up and made a nut out of the worst possible material....not the cheapest, but in my books it would have to be a sound insulator, and then see what effect it has on the sound of say a guitar in general