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Amen, Don!

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Joe Breault
Merrimack, NH
Perpetual novice

Sam,

In the UK you should also be able to occasionally find fruitwoods like Plum or Pear that are like Cherry, nice closed grain and offer a subdued light colored wood for instruments. I believe that Colin has used Pear (for Lute staves). Yew can be a nice accent for bindings. I have used figured bits for headplates. Holly makes a really nice, very light colored wood for contrast.

I second Colin's recommendation of London Plane...it is a very nice wood. I have worked on violin family restorations and encountered it was the neck so it is stable once dried. It tends to move alot while drying but is very stable once dry.

/\ Pear really appeals to me. If colour matching wasn't a factor, I reckon Cherry would be tonally compatible with a cedar top...

My woodworking pal is absolutely hooked on Yew. He thinks he's got enough to give me for a neck, but I am not sure if it would be an easy wood to work with.

Sam, I've built two lutes using Yew for the back staves, cut from a tree that came down in my garden in the 1987 storm. I'm still cutting the tree, but as it was one of the 1000+ year old trees large wood it diffucult to get that hasn't got any drying cracks as it was mostly just a shell. I believe that you can, rarely, get B&S wood Yew from David Dyke but would probably have to go with a four piece back, which to me is no problem. The 10-course Venere was one of the lutes (link above) , and I've used a lot of pear and plum as well for necks and pegs. But as I said before, for Cherry you really need the native Prunus avens rather than the ornamentals or fruiting trees.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

I have a question about cherry, specifically its stability when using flatsawn pieces.

I have a decent stash of the stuff that's been air dried for probably 30 years or so. A couple of the pieces are wide enough to get back sets out of, and I can get side sets out of the others. Probably a dozen sets altogether.

Only problem is it's flat-sawn. Because of this, I've been thinking of using it someday for non-lutherie-related projects. But I have seen guitars that have been built from flatsawn wood, and reports are that they've been stable. But I know that the stability can vary between species.

So, can anybody here comment as to cherry's stability when flat-sawn? Should I forget about trying to use it for guitar wood, or is it worth a try?

Best,

Michael

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Live to Play, Play to Live

Michael
I would be nervous using flatsawn wood for guitar backs
and sides. As a general rule there would be twice as
much movement in a flatsawn board compared to a quartersawn board.
An example: For cherry.
A 2% change in moisture content, a quartersawn back at 15" wide =.038 of movement.
A 2% change in moisture content, a flatsawn back at
15" wide = .075 of movement.
You could always use it for laminated necks.
I hope this helps.

Tom

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http://www.moriciguitar.com

I raised this very question with Sam Irwin (Lowden then Avalon's production manager) on Thursday as I have a friend who's a tree surgeon with a yard FULL of local wood.

Sam says don't go near oak, not any use as a tonewood.

I'm a big fan of getting wood cheap and using what you got.

My last dread and Mando both has port Orford Cedar necks and 4 piece walnut backs as that was the wood I had scrounged from the dumpster.......

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[QUOTE=martinedwards] I raised this very question with Sam Irwin (Lowden then Avalon's production manager) on Thursday as I have a friend who's a tree surgeon with a yard FULL of local wood.

Sam says don't go near oak, not any use as a tonewood.[/quote]

That's handy to know. One had been tempted, but one has wondered about the heaviness of the wood...

[quote]I'm a big fan of getting wood cheap and using what you got.
[/QUOTE]

1+

At my stage, acquiring wood by this means enables me to build and feed my family. We've got forests aplenty that are being managed in my county, and I've just gotta tap into the system.

What I'm dreading is that I'll have to end up buying sets due to having to air dry anything I get, and that would mean a LONG wait!!

Martinedwards wrote:
"I raised this very question with Sam Irwin (Lowden then Avalon's production manager) on Thursday as I have a friend who's a tree surgeon with a yard FULL of local wood.

Sam says don't go near oak, not any use as a tonewood. "

With all due respect, has Sam ever _built_ any guitars using quartered oak? I've built several, and while it's not Brazilian rosewood, it's not bad. OTOH, it's sure hard to sell, in part because there's so much prejudice against it.

Sam Price wrote:
"That's handy to know. One had been tempted, but one has wondered about the heaviness of the wood... "

It's generally not much denser than a rosewood, and, in any case, density is quite possibly not a detriment in a back wood, and may be a help. Also, quartered oak is no more unstable than BRW. I would, however not want to use flat cut oak.

Well I have to agree with Alan on this one. QS Oak is just fine as a tonewood. I have built several with QS white oak. John How recently built one from English Brown oak and he said it sounds great. Like Alan said Oak has been given a bad rap making Oak guitars difficult to sell.

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Beautiful and unusual tone woods at a reasonable price.
http://www.rctonewoods.com/RCT_Store
The Zootman
1109 Military Rd.
Kenmore, NY 14217
(716) 874-1498

Even my first made out of oak ply sounded ok!

I have two sets of the Culey White Oak from BobC and I cannot wait to work with it. There is alot of Oak types and some I am sure are better than others for potential use as a tonewoods.

Mike
White Oak, Texas

Oak makes a fine sounding guitar, But not all oak.
and I think that is why if your building 100's of
guitars a year. You would choose not to use it.
White Oak is hard to mistake for red. But it is
hard to know what species you have when you use red.

I would avoid Live Oak and Overcup Oak. The movement
possible in these oaks are too much for instruments.
At least in my opinion.
Qsawn white is close to the same stability as Hard maple
I think there is a few hard maple instruments around.
The larson Bros. used oak for some of there builds,
I had a 17" wide flat top of there's In the shop
some years back that was made of curly white.
It was almost 60 years old at the time, it had great
tone and power. So whats wrong with Oak.

Tom

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http://www.moriciguitar.com

Hello, not new to the group but have not posted for a time, some of the woods i use:
Redwood, Doug fir, Walnut and Maple all very local woods for me.. also looking into acacia and Olive.
Here is a picture or a redwood tirger top, hollowbody x braced guitar.

BrandonM38984.062974537