Do plywood guitars break in?

[Encinitastubes]

I had a Collings steel string once that developed a low end after a few years. I was wondering if plywood guitars, like my relatively new 175, will change over time. Anyone?

[3625]

In my experience yes, both with nitro and poly (taking into account the above mentioned variables) and like TruthHertz says: a lot of playing is involved.

Something to be said for sticking with an instrument for a while to get the best out of it.

[Alder Statesman]

A mediocre guitar that has been played, will often sound better than a "high-end" guitar that was put on display and not played. There are a number of accounts of Ramirez classical guitars that were displayed for years, but sounded "dead" when finally played.

I am convinced based on my personal experience that the same is true of archtop guitars. My laminated Broadway sounded better six months after it was purchased and the guitars gets played daily.

[wildschwein]

Sounds like voodoo or magic but I think playing a guitar, however it is constructed, and letting music resonate through the body makes it more and more musical sounding over time. Maybe with laminates it's different because of adhesives but I don't know.

I've heard Steve Vai say things like you impart a personality onto an instrument by playing it. Also, I have heard Robert Godin, in relation to acoustic guitars (with solid tops), talking about imprinting your own pattern onto an instrument and how you should play all over the neck to really imprint the most musical pattern onto a new instrument, as opposed to just hanging round the nut and the 12th and 5th frets etc. He even suggests leaving the guitar near a sound source like a stereo speaker.

Don't know if I have answered the question but I guess if you keep playing it should sound better. On the other hand all this could just be psychological nonsense and worth nothing. I find the human ear has a short memory.

[oldane]

When I got my Painter P-350 from Tom, it sounded good amplified from day one but I wrote here on this forum that it's acoustic sound was "like a monkey farting in a tin can". A few years have passed and I THINK the acoustic tone has mellowed somewhat. Now, it IS a laminate guitar and it IS only 2½" deep, so obviously it will never be equivalent to a Stromberg Master 400 - but anyway. Now its acoustic sound is like "a monkey trying to play saxophone". That's real progress! It's perfectly usable for practice unplugged.

When Tom made guitars, he made the laminated wood himself based on what the customer ordered. I figure that the setting of the glues in the plywood would help the tone along the road. Some people can hear a difference like I think I can, while others can't hear the difference in their guitar. Maybe it plays a role how long the plywood has been stored on the shelf before being made into a guitar? With my Painter guitar, the plywood was freshly made.

[Greentone]

A mediocre guitar that has been played, will often sound better than a "high-end" guitar that was put on display and not played. There are a number of accounts of Ramirez classical guitars that were displayed for years, but sounded "dead" when finally played.

I am convinced based on my personal experience that the same is true of archtop guitars. My laminated Broadway sounded better six months after it was purchased and the guitars gets played daily.

This I know to be true. When I was young, my best friend's father had--but didn't play--a very nice Ramirez. It resided in a display case. Meanwhile, I was learning on a nice early-60s Yairi classical guitar. When I got to play the Ramirez (freshly strung), I was surprised that it was uninspiring. My Yairi sounded better. Later on, when my friend was studying classical guitar, I heard and played the Ramirez again. Wow! The guitar just needed a few years of playing on a steady basis.

There was no comparison, at that point...the Ramirez was clearly more sonorous than my Yairi. Guitars are meant to be played.

[jzucker]

so I'll ask the question that *NOBODY* on guitar forums ever has a good answer for. When guitars age and break in, (and speakers too for that matter), why is it that they always sound *better*?!? That's the part of the equation that I would equate with psychological and imaginative (wishful) human functions.

It would stand to reason that if an instrument's tone (or a speaker's) change over time that sometimes it would break in and sound worse.

Just something to think about...

[wildschwein]

so I'll ask the question that *NOBODY* on guitar forums ever has a good answer for. When guitars age and break in, (and speakers too for that matter), why is it that they always sound *better*?!? That's the part of the equation that I would equate with psychological and imaginative (wishful) human functions.

It would stand to reason that if an instrument's tone (or a speaker's) change over time that sometimes it would break in and sound worse.

Just something to think about...

I think I know what you are getting at here. There is a conceptual metaphor at work where we assume that all things will, through age, acquire more tonal validity (= an aspect of guitar gear enthusiast psychology). Part of it is probably just getting your ears used to what you're hearing over time. Or in the case of a guitar, getting more comfortable with the feel of it. This certainly has a large impact on how we accept what we are hearing/feeling while we play. Hence the tendency to perceive things "breaking in" in a good way. The human ear quickly adapts to different sounds too. I find this when playing through Mesa Boogie amps. You can pull a killer sound without the EQ -- but when you switch it on and take out some mids, boost the tops and the bottoms with the classic 'V' scoop you quickly get used to that sound; and when you go back to your original tone, without the EQ, it sounds like shit for a while until your ears readjust.

It's amazing though how much gear people flip (as evidenced on TGP) based on on their perceived dissatisfaction at one point in time -- only to remember back later and then miss what they "recall" hearing. I used a borrowed Boss 1/2 rack space digital delay (12 bit) in the '90s and had very fond memories of it. However, when I picked one up, more than a decade later, I couldn't understand what I had ever seen/heard in the thing -- it was a cheap/tacky sound and could easily be replaced by a $20 Behringer digital delay. But, I had used it in the past to create music, which I remember fondly, because that's all that was available to me at the time. The memory of the gear is caught up in the mise en scène in my "rear view mirror", so to speak.

I have learned the the hard and expensive lesson that there is little satisfaction in acquiring lots of gear . All the pedal flipping, speaker changes, tube rolling and tape-echo simulacrum searches etc. are all rather pointless (my wife also hates it). I'm actually happier when I'm practising and playing rather than tone chasing. Finding something that works and then sticking to it is probably better for me in terms of moving forward with new musical ideas.

[jzucker]

Well if a piece of wood has not been exposed to musical vibration, it's just that: a piece of wood. If that wood IS exposed to vibrations, it needs to vibrate along certain patterns. And what if over time these patterns, like a piece of folded paper, learned or fatigued along these lines to vibrate more easily, wouldn't that be a GOOD thing?
A vibrating wooden body of a guitar becomes looser along the lines of vibration through use. It becomes easier to move and takes less energy to be responsive to vibration. Stiffness is the enemy of movement and vibration. Playing in creates lines of easier movement along places for certain frequencies. That's why playing in makes a top and back vibrate easier. Less stiff=more response. No mystery.
I think post #7 might have hinted at this. I don't know. Seems clear to me.

David

Ummmm....No. If a guitar's tone changes over time, why is it that 100% of the time the tone improves. The law of averages says that if the tone changes radically enough to be noticeable, 50% of the time it should change the sound for the worse. But not according to the interweb.

[jzucker]

Exactly! You nailed it. I did a couple tests where in my studio I recorded a SS guitar amp when it (and the speaker) were new. 6 months later, after hours of playing a day, it sounded better to me. Folks on the forums would say the speaker broke in. However, recordings of the amp compared to the original show that it has not changed in any way that can be heard. Conclusion - Speaker break-in is somewhat of a myth. What really "breaks in" is your ear and brain get used to and normalize the sound.

And I believe guitar break-in is similar. I believe the sound does change but I think most of it is psychological.

I think I know what you are getting at here. There is a conceptual metaphor at work where we assume that all things will, through age, acquire more tonal validity (= an aspect of guitar gear enthusiast psychology). Part of it is probably just getting your ears used to what you're hearing over time. Or in the case of a guitar, getting more comfortable with the feel of it. This certainly has a large impact on how we accept what we are hearing/feeling while we play. Hence the tendency to perceive things "breaking in" in a good way. The human ear quickly adapts to different sounds too. I find this when playing through Mesa Boogie amps. You can pull a killer sound without the EQ -- but when you switch it on and take out some mids, boost the tops and the bottoms with the classic 'V' scoop you quickly get used to that sound; and when you go back to your original tone, without the EQ, it sounds like shit for a while until your ears readjust.

It's amazing though how much gear people flip (as evidenced on TGP) based on on their perceived dissatisfaction at one point in time -- only to remember back later and then miss what they "recall" hearing. I used a borrowed Boss 1/2 rack space digital delay (12 bit) in the '90s and had very fond memories of it. However, when I picked one up, more than a decade later, I couldn't understand what I had ever seen/heard in the thing -- it was a cheap/tacky sound and could easily be replaced by a $20 Behringer digital delay. But, I had used it in the past to create music, which I remember fondly, because that's all that was available to me at the time. The memory of the gear is caught up in the mise en scène in my "rear view mirror", so to speak.

I have learned the the hard and expensive lesson that there is little satisfaction in acquiring lots of gear . All the pedal flipping, speaker changes, tube rolling and tape-echo simulacrum searches etc. are all rather pointless (my wife also hates it). I'm actually happier when I'm practising and playing rather than tone chasing. Finding something that works and then sticking to it is probably better for me in terms of moving forward with new musical ideas.

[ruger9]

so I'll ask the question that *NOBODY* on guitar forums ever has a good answer for. When guitars age and break in, (and speakers too for that matter), why is it that they always sound *better*?!? ..

I submit they don't (not ALL of them)- some sound "worse".... again, we're talking personal preferences here.... "one man's trash is another man's treasure".... one mans "warm" is another mans "congested", and one mans "clarity" is another mans "brightness"...

But I have heard recordings where people have used a... Play-rite? That mechanical thing that you plug in and it vibrates the top to supposedly do the same thing playing the guitar does to break it in... and on all 3 guitars I heard it used on, we are talking side-by-side recorded comparisons here, I liked every guitar LESS after the treatment, they all lost bass and sounded thinner and weaker to my ears.

[jzucker]

Disagree. Guitars are not overbuilt. They are built to sound great the day they are finished. Nobody builds a guitar with a 10 year target date.

Have you ever discussed this with a top luthier like benedetto or d'aquisto? I have. They build for it to sound great when they put it in the player's hands. No luthier has enough data to shoot for a break-in target date.

You and I just have very different tonal goals so it's unlikely we'll ever agree on tone but I do know that luthiers may think about making an instrument last but they almost all plan for it to sound it's best when they hand it over to the customer.

IMO, the break-in-period is a marketing ploy and internet legend. It's way easier to say that the guitar doesn't sound good now but will once it's broken in. And again, simple statistics yield the real clue which is that it's impossible that in 100% of the cases it sounds better after the break-in. If you think the luthiers have advanced physics degrees and are shooting for a break-in time 5 years down the road where they have optimized the cellular degeneration I think you might be slightly delusional. We all want to think our instruments get better with age. And they may, but I doubt that timeframe is measure in anything less than decades and most likely we're talking centuries.

Anyway, i'm ducking out. Have a nice day.

You have to look at the data. A guitar that is built for longevity, ie. overbuilt by handbuilt standards (100% of production guitars-including post war Gibsons) they will be stiff and non compliant from the build. The play in curve is merely working towards an ideal response for a playing instrument. That means 100% of the time an overbuilt guitar can vibrate more freely, move more air for a given amount of input energy, and do this along the lines a played guitar wants to go, it's going to sound better.
But that's not always the case. Instruments can play OUT too. Talk to any classical guitar owner, whose guitars are built to very precise and delicately exacting acoustic standards (nylon strings have less energy, the top needs to be built lighter and the high end guitars are tuned more optimally from the start) and they are accepted to have a peak playing life of 12-20 years, after which this process of play in results in a guitar that is too loose.
Archtops are different. Like violins, their primary force is downward compression and not sheer like a flat top. But accounting for that, yes, an instrument will have a play in period, a peak period and a play out. Stradavarius never heard his violins at peak. Torres guitars are well beyond the best years of their life. An archtop will be built on the upcurve of this arc. Now if you had someone build so lightly that it sounds great from the start but the loosening up process starts to collapse and compress the top from the start, there's the flip side you're looking for. But professional seasoned luthiers try to avoid that. It's really not a good practice.
I've seen early models of luthiers (by good luthiers too) where they did sound good and they don't now. This is accompanied at times by catastrophic structural failure. Have you ever seen a top collapse? I have. It sound like crap and it's not a pretty sight.
Don't think just because your sample is 100% that it tells the whole story.
David

[Encinitastubes]

Disagree. Guitars are not overbuilt. They are built to sound great the day they are finished. Nobody builds a guitar with a 10 year target date.

Have you ever discussed this with a top luthier like benedetto or d'aquisto? I have. They build for it to sound great when they put it in the player's hands. No luthier has enough data to shoot for a break-in target date.

You and I just have very different tonal goals so it's unlikely we'll ever agree on tone but I do know that luthiers may think about making an instrument last but they almost all plan for it to sound it's best when they hand it over to the customer.

IMO, the break-in-period is a marketing ploy and internet legend. It's way easier to say that the guitar doesn't sound good now but will once it's broken in. And again, simple statistics yield the real clue which is that it's impossible that in 100% of the cases it sounds better after the break-in. If you think the luthiers have advanced physics degrees and are shooting for a break-in time 5 years down the road where they have optimized the cellular degeneration I think you might be slightly delusional. We all want to think our instruments get better with age. And they may, but I doubt that timeframe is measure in anything less than decades and most likely we're talking centuries.

Anyway, i'm ducking out. Have a nice day.

I disasgree about the luthiers. Perhaps "overbuilt" is the wrong word. I spoke with Bill Collings about this and he told me he builds his guiitars tight intentionally. He said that Sitka spruce takes a few years to looses up, Adirondak can take much longer, and that Cedar is almost immediate. He told me that he didn't like to work with Cedar because he felt it peaked after about 20 years. (I'm not sure I agree with this as my 1969 Cedar-topped Oribe classical is phenomenal). My experience having purchased two new Collings was that they were initially lush, but developed a more traditional tone and bigger bottom end after a few years. That was appealing to me, but might not be to some.

[mr. beaumont]

Life's too short for me to wait around on a guitar. If there's one that doesn't sound great now, there's another that does.

I do think guitars sound different over time...shit, they can sound different day to day! Whether or not they sound better is pretty subjective.

Some changes are tangible though, like how the satin finish neck in my Taylor glossed up nicely, but didn't get "sticky" after playing it a lot. But tone?

[ruger9]

Life's too short for me to wait around on a guitar.

Ain't that the TRUTH!!!

[Encinitastubes]

Buy used or live longer. I like to do both.

[Alder Statesman]

While the OP's topic was laminated guitars, the classical guitar, particularly "concert guitars" provide excellent examples. In Jose Ramirez's book, Things About the Guitar, he explains that with spruce or cedar topped guitars, the varnish crystallizes the long thin grain of the wood. Playing the guitar alters the structure of the varnish allowing the grain to resonate more. The analogy is the grain resonates like a collection of thin strings.

Compare the grain on a concert guitar top to a student guitar. The grain is dense, fine and straight as an arrow on the concert guitar. The high end guitar will have twice the grain or more.

The "playing in" of spruce tops takes longer than cedar tops, but this is not a long process. Playing in a spruce top would take a few weeks or months, while a cedar top is much shorter. On a number of occasions, I could hear a cedar guitar open up during its initial playing.

A quality guitar will sound good day one, but resonate more after being played in.

Ramirez revolutionized the concert guitar with his use of western red cedar. Segovia popularized the Ramirez 1a cedar top with its long scale. The sides of this guitar were lined with cypress so to some extend we can call this a plywood guitar.

Interestingly, the spruce tops, while taking a bit longer to play in, will sound good for a longer period of time. Most cedar topped classical guitars sound dead after a few decades. A 1980's Ramirez with a cedar top may look good, but I would not want to play one at home or in a concert hall. A new high grade student instrument would likely sound better and project farther. A spruce topped classical from the 80's just might hold its own.

Now does any of this apply to a laminated archtop? Just a bit in IMO.

[TedBPhx]

My Washburn J600 sounds much better to me after 3 months. I think I just learned how to play it. The guitar broke me in.

[ChrisDowning]

Its why the collectors / investors in fine top end orchestral intruments lend them out to top players. An instrument needs paying all the time to keep it sweet. Even museums getbthe instruments out and have someone pay them regularly.

Of course which direction any guitar goes - gets better / gets worse - is probably inthe basic build and materials. Cedar is supposed to sound good from the start and spruce needs playing in. Certainly my cedar-topped classical never changed sound.

[GNAPPI]

I'm not sure if it's that the player gets better over time being able to coax more from the instrument or if the git actually mellows but, I'm inclined to believe the former.

Mr.B has it right "Life's too short for me to wait around on a guitar" I won't buy a guitar I don't like the way it sounds. If I have one that I lose interest in because something in a new one pleases me more, I sell it.

Oh the gadget to exercise the wood in an archtop is IIRC a tone rite.

[ChrisDowning]

Big advantage of buying when its already old - it ain't gonna change much. Ditto -I'd never buy a guitar based on what it might sound like in ten years. Frankly, violins, cellos and the like start off way more expensive than your average guitar anyway but are still expected to play in over the coming years - but hey guys txhose $30,000 violins are not made of ply. I think with a ply guitar you can expect it to be what tis on day one. (No! don't ask about ply violins - there aren't any over about $40!!)

[Greentone]

Jzucker
Classical guitars open up, sound better, then start sounding bad. They have a lifespan. I don’t know if other guitars do...maybe it's just longer.

[mr. beaumont]

Jzucker
Classical guitars open up, sound better, then start sounding bad. They have a lifespan. I don’t know if other guitars do...maybe it's just longer.

That is what they say, about spruce tops, that is. I've never owned a really high grade classical, so I can't comment.

Cedar pretty much sounds like it's going to sound from day one.

I think a lot of guitars outlive people, on the "sounding good" part.

[Archie]

In my experience yes, both with nitro and poly (taking into account the above mentioned variables) and like TruthHertz says: a lot of playing is involved.

Something to be said for sticking with an instrument for a while to get the best out of it.

I'm gonna throw this out there in my usual brash manner and say, I dont think poly or Nitro makes the slightest bit of difference. I have come to realise this now through experience.

The most acoustic sounding guitars I have played are finished in poly, the Honfenr Jazzica and New president. They sound more woody and more acoustic than the majority of 17" Gibson's I haver tried, regardless of wether carved or laminate and finished in nitro.

If anything Nitros cracks and looks ugly and can damage your guar by exposing the surface of the wood to all sorts of gunk.

Im a poly man these days but Nitro does look lovely but nitro cracks (except on Guilds for some reason for the most part) and when it cracks, you lose the point of it looking a little nicer in the beginning.

In regards to the OP yes I think laminates can change in sound over time. I haven't experienced it personally but have judged it by how older laminate guitar seem to have a certain sound. Of course this could be a fallacy but Im happy to live with it.

I do like the comment above about the guitar "breaking me in" I think that ses a lot about how the way we respond to something can lead us to believe one thing when it is probably because of something else.

You do learn to play a guitar better over time as you settle into it (if you do and its a keeper) and that will of course improve the way you sound on it. Nothing to do with the guitar!

[mr. beaumont]

I'll agree and be contrarian at the same time

I think EVERYTHING matters when it comes to tone, right down to how humid it is in the room that very moment.

Now...can our ears actually hear the difference? I doubt it.