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So I got a few projects coming up for the next year a Selmer style small hole long scale and a sort of D28ish dreadnaught. The Selmer is getting walnut back and sides with Sitka top. The dreadnaught I’m going to try for the D28 forward shifted brace kind of thing but what’s a good sub for BRW for the back and sides for tone not looks? I only care about tone not looks and seen folks say Indian Rosewood may not be as close in tone as some others. Your thoughts for a brw sub that could still get in the ballpark of that old school d28 tone? O I plan to use Sitka for the dread top also.

Wenge, bubinga, Osage orange.

Yep subjective but to my ear the closest thing to BRW that I ever built with and heard was Honduran Rosewood. It's a little brick red for my taste but it sounds like heaven.

I made a copy of a ‘37 D28 with Honduran Rosewood and red spruce top. I think it sounds great! Using a dark brown pore filler can help mitigate the red tint that Hesh refers to.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

I’m no expert in the stuff, but the one time I used Honduran Rosewood for something, it didn’t like my edge tools very much; planes and chisels (even though very sharp) left a weird, pitted surface. Abrasive planing worked better. Maybe I just had bad pieces.

Many people say Osage Orange is the nearest thing, but it is orange, although it mellows a bit with time.

Maybe? The last two I built were of Honduran Rosewood and I did not have that experience.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Osage Orange darkens as it ages and is not too orange then. The bigger problem is finding large enough sets.


I have used panama rosewood that tested real close to BRW but it is very hard to get.

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http://www.Harvestmoonguitars.com

Another vitreous sounding wood is Padauk. It is also very reasonably priced. Somogyi describes it and Wenge as a BRW alternative. Both make a fine guitar, and you can build 20 guitars for what a marginal Brazilian set sells for.

Best, M

While tough to find wide and clear enough lumber, black locust is a great domestic option. As mentioned a few times above as well, osage orange...
And Michael's padauk suggestion...great sounding timber!

Doc

Three out of the last five I’ve made have been padauk and I’m working on a fourth. Still affordable, looks great, sounds great, easily available in wide boards for large guitars. I especially like the fact that clear, straight grain is the norm with Padauk, as I prefer that minimalist look vs curly/busy grain.

Maybe the red is color is off-putting for some customers but just as many find it striking.



Some say it turns brown over time and I don’t have any really old padauk guitars in the wild to comment on that. My first padauk guitar (2015) came back into the shop this year for a visit and it had lost none of its brilliant red hue after six years. I suspect the fact I use a thin epoxy coat under the lacquer helps with keeping the colour vibrant:

Padauk is a bit splitty, so be careful flexing it in the cross grain direction. It makes a nice guitar, though, and the stuff I have is right in the same class as BRW in terms of its mechanical and acoustic properties. It goes to a medium brown over time.

I'm a big fan of Osage, although it 's very hard to work with hand tools. There is almost no 'with' the grain if you plane it, either by hand or with a planer, but it scrapes well enough. Again, right in the BRW class. Fuming with household ammonia darkens it enough to get rid of the 'raw' look. Over time it can get quite dark.

Black locust is in the Indian rosewood class for density and stiffness, but has the low damping/long ring and musical tone of Brazilian when tapped. It makes a light and responsive instrument. It also darkens much more than Osage when fumed with ammonia; don't go too far or it can look a bit green, although that fades with time.

I've used padauk, and as Alan says, I've found it to be a bit splitty, but no biggie.

When it's fresh, the sawdust is really really orange (and I end up with orange cat paw prints through the house if I don't get it cleaned up quick enough....). But it does settle into a nice reddish brown hue over time. Plus it does sound very good. I like it a lot.

Dave

When you say splitty I cringe when I look at my hot pipe! I know the sound

I think we all know that sound. Not what you want to hear!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

The padauk I have is very straight grained, with no run out to speak of. Bending it along the grain, as for sides, presents no problem. It splits when you try to bend it across the grain. You have to be careful: it has high cross grain stiffness, and it takes a fair amount of force to get it to bend at all. It doesn't take much more than that to split it. I got into the habit when working it to cut the sides a bit long and put something across the ends to hold them together. Masking tape is surprisingly effective, but a strip of paper about 1" wide glued on both surfaces works even better. Use a block across the end rather than your hand to push it against the bending iron to avoid local cross bending. When you go to trim off the ends of the sides to length put masking tape across them, pulled tight. I like to trim to length with a knife, scribing both surfaces deeply, and then using a backing block at the scribe mark to bend the wood against the bench top. This is especially useful with wood that had little or no run out.

I'll note that with figured side wood paper glued to the outside surface of the bend (the side away from the iron, that is in tension) really cuts down on split out. Even white copy paper works well, and you can use almost any sort of glue. Paper is strong stuff.

I bent very curly, quartered, striped Padauk, by hand for a Stauffer guitar and a violin. Some of it bent ok, but one section of light wood on the outside edge would not. It had something that looked like cross grain silking on spruce there. I would think if it wasn't stupid curly it would bend easy.

Curly wood does sell though! Both before and after.

When you tap boards, it does have a rich, deeper tap tone. I don't know what that means, but it's fun to do. Hard to do online.

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Why be normal?

Curl reduces the long-grain Young's modulus, which determines the stiffness at a given thickness. That tends to give a lower pitched tap tone, all else equal.