Official Luthiers Forum!

OK, now that I am getting close on my rosette, I get down to my top issues.  I posted some time back, a thread on grain direction, that moved into the runout discussion.  That is still the top in question.  There is definitely some runout, but I don't know if it is significant, or not.  Should I just glue up another top, or work with this one.  This one, has nice ring, and I was told it was stiff when I bought it, but you couldn't prove it by my feel - first top I ever felt in the raw (the top that is ).  Here are a couple of pictures of the top.  I was having trouble getting clear pictures showing the grain, which is dead 90*.   This is AA Sitka as I recall.

 

 

You can see the slight variation in color.  Grain on the right side as you look at it runs top to bottom, and grain on the left bottom to top.  When wiping with a cloth you can feel it.  Also, you can't scrape against the grain very cleanly.  Now, if I use this top, since it is my first build.  Should I make a 4 piece top out of it this way.  Pics of the wings, and the add on possibilities from cut-offs.

Treble wing:
 

Bass wing:
 

I know you can't really tell from pictures, but I would appreciate any help I can get in making a determination of my own.  Scrapping this top is certainly an option.  I have one other Sitka top, several Lutz tops, and one German Spruce top in the wings, any of which I could join up, thickness and cut out.  I tried splitting a piece of this, and it split on an angle at about 15*, but I am not an experienced splitter, so I may not have done it right.  It did do the same at both ends of the stick I was splitting though.  One other thing that could have an effect on that is that it came from the outside wings where the grain is much wider spaced, and not as straight.  I used an old Grill Scraper blade sharpened to a point \/ like that then dulled to a rounded point, to do the splitting.  It worked pretty well on my braces.

Any thoughts you might have on the subject would be a help, and certainly appreciated, except, of course, "Go pound sand!"

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Waddy - you're making a classical, right?

I was going to say to use it and not worry too much about the runout (no runout is desierable, but a little bit of runout isn't going to ruin your guitar).

With that said - chunk it, or keep it for a steel string. In my opinion, you're setting yourself up for disappointment if you use Sitka for a classical top. With the sole exception of John Gilbert, I've never heard of any classical maker who wasn't sorely disappointed with Sitka spruce. It simply does not make a good classical guitar.

You're doing a good job on everything, as evidenced by your rosette and the job you did on those wings. Based on that, here's my suggestion: use the German spruce.

German Spruce will give you the most potential to come out with a great sounding guitar in the end. With Sitka you're likely to be drastically limiting the potential of this build.. may as well use the best if you're going to be putting all this time in.

_________________
Instagram: @jfrenchluthier
Web: https://www.jfrenchguitars.com/

Yes it is a classical, and that is a point I have also been pondering. I guess I knew Sitka was not as desireable as some of the other spruces for classical tops, but I also knew that Gilbert, had had good luck with it.  Mostly, it was cheap at the time, and my first thinking on this build was that it would probably be a disaster, anyway, but that sort of thinking is changing as I progress, and as I see some of the first builds on this forum.  Your suggestion is probably a very good one. It will also give me experience joining another set, and feeling another joined set as to stiffness, etc..  Not bad experience to have.

What causes Sitka to be poor for classical builds?

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

As far as the variation in color. Because you are book matching two planks cut from the same billet one will appear a different shade than the other. But notice, if you turn the set around the plank that was darker now appears to be the light one. this is due to the run out of the grain. Unless the top was perfect quartered. which is not likely. This is a normal thing and is not very noticeable under finish unless you are looking for it or have a lot of run out.

Waddy - Your first build is not going to be anything near a disaster. Go with the German. You're even making your own rosette... don't put all that work into a Sitka soundboard.

One could say John Gilbert had some success with Sitka, but thats only one exception. I'm not sure what makes the Sitka so unsuitable, I have only a little experience with it and have never made a classical with it. Maybe its too hard or dense, I don't know. But I can absolutely guarantee that you'll end up with a better guitar using the German.

_________________
Instagram: @jfrenchluthier
Web: https://www.jfrenchguitars.com/

Sitka is denser than German and often less stiff to downright rubbery when cut a bit off the quarter. These characteristics can make for a great steel string guitar as much of the undesirable high frequencies are dampened by these same qualities. Steel string bracing is such that top quality in terms of cut means much less than on a classical.

German Spruce has the most stiffness for the least density which is why I agree with Joshua that it is the top choice.........I'd recommend your using it for this build as well, and any other classicals you make in the future.   

Thanks, guys.  I guess I'll be joining up a German top. Sprechen sie Deutsch?  I remember Shawn saying that Jose liked the Lutz he took to his first class.  Any thoughts on Lutz for classicals, or does it have similar properties.  I think he said Jose liked the long fibers in Lutz.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Mike Collins?

Maybe I'm just dense?   Huh?

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Mike's a particular fan of Lutz for his Classical guitars........I was hoping he might chime in here on the subject..............

Oh, I see.  I am dense.   It would be nice to know, since I have a few sets, but I'm in for the German for now.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

[QUOTE=jfrench]
With that said - chunk it, or keep it for a steel string. In my opinion, you're setting yourself up for disappointment if you use Sitka for a classical top. With the sole exception of John Gilbert, I've never heard of any classical maker who wasn't sorely disappointed with Sitka spruce. It simply does not make a good classical guitar.

German Spruce will give you the most potential to come out with a great sounding guitar in the end. With Sitka you're likely to be drastically limiting the potential of this build.. may as well use the best if you're going to be putting all this time in. [/QUOTE]

Don't mean to step on toes, but I gotta pipe in here. I don't buy into the anti-sitka bias, not do I buy into the pro-German bias for classicals.

I have built only one sitka topped classical, but everyone who has played that guitar has really liked the sound. It is loud and full, bright yet sonorous. Also, regarding German or Euro spruce, on several occasions here I have stated my preference for Shane's Lutz over Euro spruce, and I have not had reason to change them. The Euro stuff I see nowadays, even the AAA tops, just don't compare to Shane's stuff.

I chose to build the sitka topped classical to find for myself what it was about sitka that people didn't like. The set I selected I bought off ebay for about $20. It was perfectly quartered, had little to no run-out, had a very nice tap tone, but wasn't particularly stiff. I used cocobolo for the back and sides and my own radial bracing pattern. No complaints.

So, I say go ahead and build the guitar with a sitka top. You just might be pleasantly surprised how good it sounds.

Best,

Michael

_________________
Live to Play, Play to Live

I have built several flamenco guitars with Sitka spruce but only built a few classical guitars in the 70's with Sitka tops.

The main reason why Sitka is not used for classicals is that it takes more to get the range of tonal color and sound out of a Sitka top. For Steel string guitars that have higher tension strings and are more likely to be strummed, Sitka is a very good choice.

My thinking in using it for flamenco guitars was that it would take more punishment than a englemann, western red cedar, or redwood top. Because of the more vigorous playing style of flamenco, the sound of the Sitka tops tend to open up faster than a classical and in most cases the difference in tone in a flamenco is less critical than a classical.

The classicals I was trying to build with Sitka tops were an attempt to achieve what Gilbert had as I was intrigued by the "T girder" braces he used and other aspects of his construction. Some of these Sitka guitars opened up with time but in general they never achieved what a really good Euro spruce could.

Another aspect of why I used to try to use Sitka for classicals and flamencos was the temptation to try to use a less grade wood to spend less on materials. When I started I did not have much money but thought that a classical had to have a rosewood (brazilian) sides and back so I cheaped out on the top wood. Since then I have realized that the most important factor in the entire guitar is the top so while I have had generally good results with Sitka for a classical/flamenco, for me it is now only Euro Spruce or Lutz Spruce.

Having said that, a top is not good because it is German, Italian, Sitka, or whatever...a great log can be ruined by a sawyer who doesnt understand what runout is and likewise a twisty log can not produce a great top, no matter who cut it.

My preference for Euro Spruce is for a top with long consistent grain that is not too fine and not too coarse. What I liked about the Lutz Spruce that I got from Shane was that for a wood that is not European Spruce, it shared all of the characteristics that I liked in Euro Spruce.

When Jose Romanillos saw my Lutz Spruce last year at the Romanillos class, he commented that he was not aware of North American spruce that was similar to Euro Spruce other than Englemann, which while it can look like Euro Spruce, is far softer and Englemann trees tend to twist so they have more runout whereas the logs Shane has had are straighter and he is very careful in splitting and processing them into tops.

This year for the Romanillos class I was going to take Lutz Spruce but instead was able to bring a Swiss Spruce top that was cut in the 1930'a. The color of age had so permeated the top that even though I took it from 4mm down to 2mm, there were still streaks of darker color that remained for a really vintage aged look.

One of the things that Jose Romanillos stresses is that if possible eliminate all runout when possible, build only with the best quality spruce you have access to and that has little to do with the look or price of the spruce. If that means going with a 3 or 4 peice top instead of a 2 piece top of less quality, then that is what is needed to achieve the best sounding guitar possible.

The thing about runout is that it reduces the ability of the top to transmit maximum energy into vibrating the top which in turn moves the air in the guitar, creating the projection of the sound. Any loss of energy will robs the guitar of its potential.

[QUOTE=Michael McBroom]

I have built only one sitka topped classical, but everyone who has played that guitar has really liked the sound. It is loud and full, bright yet sonorous.
Michael

[/QUOTE]

Ive built two classicals so far using sitka and both have sounded pretty much as you've described. The owners are certainly not dissapointed with the sound. The next classical will have a Lutz top.

Cheers Martin

Thanks, everyone, for your comments and suggestions.  Maybe the Sitka could work, but I am now on track to use the German Spruce on this build.  Maybe I'll try the Sitka on a later guitar, when I feel more experimental, and understand tops and woods better.  The experience of gluing up another top, thicknessing, and feeling the stiffness vs. the one I have already done, will be a good experience anyway.  The confidence I have gained from this forum is pushing me to make the best guitar I can possibly make the first time out.  Poor, good, or great, I choose to give it the best opportunity to be great. Vorwarts und aufwarts!

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

Hmmm!  I don't know what "fwarts" is, or don't want to know!   Maybe we could do a 5 page thread on the subject!  

However, "warts" is the suffix wards in German.  Translation, "Onward and Upwards"!

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

I've been testing all of the tops I've gotten in for a few years, and the results have been interesting. One of the main conclusions I've come to is: it's the piece, not the species.

If you look at the long grain stiffness compared to the density, all of the 'usual suspects' tend to fall on the same line. That is, a top that has a density of 350 kg.meter^3 will tend to have a Young's modulus (E) along the grain of about 8500 MegaPascals, and one that's up around 500 kg/m^3 will have a lengthwise E nearer 16000. This holds for Western Red cedar, Englemann, Euro, Sitka, Western Hemlock, Redwood, and Red Spruce. There is some scatter, but that does not seem to vary with the species. Of course, you don't see much Red spruce down below 350 kg/m^3, or a lot of WRC up around 500, but a piece of either in the 400 range will have about the same long grain stiffness.

There is a huge amount of scatter in the cross grain numbers, partly doe to ring angle, of course. Sitka does tend to have somewhat lower crosswise E values than most other spruces. You can make up for that to some degree by altering your fan angle, without too much of a penalty in weight.

The one difference I've read about (but not measured myself) between Sitka and other spruces is in the damping factor: the amount of energy that's dissipated as the wood vibrates. Most woods have low damping at low frequencies, and the losses rise slowly as you go up in pitch. At about 2000 Hz the loss factors start to rise much more steeply. Sitka sarts out with higher losses at low frequencies, and the damping falls off as you go up, until, at 2kHz, it's about the same as other woods. Then it rises just like the others. Nobody knows why this might be. They're not even sure if it's really true: The subject is simply not well understood, and some of these things could simply be artifacts of the way the measurements were made.

I have only made a couple of Sitka topped classicals, and did not think they were as good as ones made with other top woods. OTOH, that was a while back, and I know a lot more now, so maybe I could do a better job with the stuff. If I were to look for a set of Sitka to make into a classical, I'd try to find one that was less dense than the average, very well quartered, and I might well try for a little bit of bearclaw, as that tends to raise the crosswise stiffness (at the expense of a little of the lengthwise stiffness).

Thanks, Alan.  That is waaaay over this novice's head, but I think I get it.  I need more wood handling experience under my belt, seems I have plenty of everything else under there, since I can hardly buckle it , so I can actually compare weights and both along the grain stiffness and cross grain stiffness.  When I feel this stuff across grain, if feels not so stiff to me, it easily bows with little pressure (of course I'm very strong ).  Now long grain is a different story.  It seems not to want to bend at all.  This is at just about 3.3 mm, I had not finished thicknessing yet.  I know that has to be normal, and I am anxious now to join up the German top and feel the difference.  Heck, who knows, I may hook up a Lutz top too, and compare all three at about 3.3 mm.  They won't spoil.

_________________
Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars