Tonewood matters for solid bodies

[Tal_175]

This guy is a bit annoying, but the experiment is pretty interesting:

Here is a follow up video of the same experiment recorded when he actually plays the guitars. You can hear differences even listening the youtube video from cheap computer speakers. How much difference does one need to recognize the effect of wood choice?

He first says he thought there was no difference then he listened to them and heard the differences but it wasn't that important to him.

Fine but that makes me laugh. He seems to be a guitar builder, next he should compare the difference between his guitars and cheap Squier's and explain why anyone should buy his guitars?

[rpjazzguitar]

I have an Alder Fender Am Std and a Yamaha Pacifica 012 in Agathis. To some, Agathis is reviled, apparently.

They don't sound the same, but they're pretty close. Add some processing and I don't know that I could tell them apart. I think the Fender sounds a little richer in the midrange but a little thinner in the upper range. You can probably buy 10 of the Yamaha used for the price of one of the Fenders (you'll have to spend a few bucks on better hardware for the Yamaha, so maybe it ends up being 7 to 1).

[citizenk74]

Supposedly the LP body was supposed to combine the soft warmth of mahogany with the hard brilliance of maple. But I always wondered if they just cancel each other out.

IIRC, Ted McCarty said in an interview that the combination of Quarter-sawn mahogany and flat-sawn Hard Maple gave them the 22 seconds of sustain/decay that they were looking for. My maple-topped '68 Les Paul Custom had that, and probably more!

[ThatRhythmMan]

Are you the fool or the angel?




I generally agree with what you say here. But one has to understand that these are generalizations and not put the bar to impossibly high levels and take things too literally. Of course there are different types of ash (northern and southern swamp) and every piece of wood is different. You can have cases a where a piece of alder and ash have opposite properties. Same is true for even acoustic guitars. A rosewood guitar may sound more like a mahogany or vise versa. Doesn't mean generalizations do not have a point.

As long as we are talking about ash species, there are actually many species of ash, and at least 3 or 4 different species that are referred to as “swamp ash”. Those alone can span from parts of Canada to Florida. I’m guessing that one of these species is more common in guitars, but I wouldn’t have any idea which. I think black ash and green ash have been especially hard hit by boring insects, so maybe one or both of those. Growing us in Oklahoma, we had mostly green ash and that wood certainly looks like what I’ve seen on Fender guitars, but I’m guessing the woods may not look very dissimilar. Does anyone actually know?

[citizenk74]

I related this experiment recently in another thread, but it seems apropos here. At one time I had three PRS Custom 24s. Save for the material of the tops, they all had identical components. Locking tuners, Corian nuts, Brazialn rosewood fingerboards, floating trems, sweet switches, Honduran mahogany necks and bodies. The tops were two Red curly or flame Maple caps from different trees, and one Pacific Coast Hard Maple (quilted). I set up all three of the in identical fashion - identical string sizes and brands, the same 12th fret action, the same pickup heights, same number of trem springs, and the same identical trem float. Tuned to the same pitches, and strumming and then immediately damping the strings, each guitar had a characteristic over-ring. These were pitched at E, B, And G.

All the non-wood parts were of identical materials. To what should we attribute the difference in over-ring, if not the woods involved?

[John A.]

Are you the fool or the angel?

The fool, always, and of course.

I generally agree with what you say here. But one has to understand that these are generalizations and not put the bar to impossibly high levels and take things too literally. Of course there are different types of ash (northern and southern swamp) and every piece of wood is different. You can have cases a where a piece of alder and ash have opposite properties. Same is true for even acoustic guitars. A rosewood guitar may sound more like a mahogany or vise versa. Doesn't mean generalizations do not have a point.

Well ... we are not talking about generalizations founded on representative samples of the guitar population and experiments that truly control for species. We're talking about subjective claims on youtube videos. We also have situations such as the bubbe meise that heavy guitars have more tone and sustain leading Fender to make guitars from heaviest ash they could find for a period of time, in turn leading some people to draw conclusions about ash that may really be more about density. So I take all of this with a grain of salt and compare entire guitars to entire guitars, not nominal specs to specs. Generalizations only have a point only to the extent they're largely true. I'm not saying this one is isn't. But it's too easy to find yabbuts in them to take them very seriously.

John

[medblues]

I related this experiment recently in another thread, but it seems apropos here. At one time I had three PRS Custom 24s. Save for the material of the tops, they all had identical components. Locking tuners, Corian nuts, Brazialn rosewood fingerboards, floating trems, sweet switches, Honduran mahogany necks and bodies. The tops were two Red curly or flame Maple caps from different trees, and one Pacific Coast Hard Maple (quilted). I set up all three of the in identical fashion - identical string sizes and brands, the same 12th fret action, the same pickup heights, same number of trem springs, and the same identical trem float. Tuned to the same pitches, and strumming and then immediately damping the strings, each guitar had a characteristic over-ring. These were pitched at E, B, And G.

All the non-wood parts were of identical materials. To what should we attribute the difference in over-ring, if not the woods involved?

The electronics (capacitors and resistor tolerances) and the pickup manufacturing variations (albeit slight but they add up) could account for quite a bit if you are hearing the difference amplified. If you are hearing the difference acoustically, then it is more likely the wood and the manufacturing variations (neck setting) and string batches. I believe that the wood makes a difference in the acoustic sound but not in a predictable and consistent way to be useful in choosing guitars without listening to them. The difference of body woods in the signals coming from the magnetic pickups can be seen in an oscilloscope tracing but is not distinguishable in a blind listening test. There are a few published experiments strongly suggesting this.

[jads57]

So Charlie Hoffman a boutique flat top guitar builder explained to me that people generally want the Tone heard on records they grew up with. Especially the famous records.
So Alder, Swamp Ash, Maple ,Mahogany, are the primary tones in Solid Body builds. Leo and company got it right to begin with, and now it's pretty much about refinements.

Anyway at some point it's more important to perseverate on your playing the instrument. Especially if the music involves more than 4 Cowboy Chords,lol!

[Tal_175]

The difference of body woods in the signals coming from the magnetic pickups can be seen in an oscilloscope tracing but is not distinguishable in a blind listening test. There are a few published experiments strongly suggesting this.

Can you please provide a link to any one of these published studies you mention that shows body wood differences are not distinguishable in blind tests. Because I cannot find any.

[citizenk74]

The electronics (capacitors and resistor tolerances) and the pickup manufacturing variations (albeit slight but they add up) could account for quite a bit if you are hearing the difference amplified. If you are hearing the difference acoustically, then it is more likely the wood and the manufacturing variations (neck setting) and string batches. I believe that the wood makes a difference in the acoustic sound but not in a predictable and consistent way to be useful in choosing guitars without listening to them. The difference of body woods in the signals coming from the magnetic pickups can be seen in an oscilloscope tracing but is not distinguishable in a blind listening test. There are a few published experiments strongly suggesting this.

The guitars were not amplified. The tonal, pitched response (checked with a strobe tuner) was audible. The guitars were resonating at those pitches sufficiently to make the trem springs vibrate audibly. The strings were all brand new, from the same box. As to manufacturing variations, you may not be familiar with PRS QC.

[GNAPPI]

Would you be able to pick out your lexan Strat from a wood strat if you play them blind-folded?

I have a half dozen wood strats and the one I can for certain pick out is my "Showmaster Strat" if you can call it a strat. The rest are just more versions of stratiness :-)

[Tal_175]

I have a half dozen wood strats and the one I can for certain pick out is my "Showmaster Strat" if you can call it a strat. The rest are just more versions of stratiness :-)

That reminds me, I need to buy more strats. I'm down to one.

[Tal_175]

Here is a neck test. I haven't watched it yet:

[John A.]

Here is a neck test. I haven't watched it yet:

I don't hear any differences. I tried listening without watching, and in some cases (where there was less of an obvious pause between guitars), I did not detect that he had changed. I'm imagine others will say they hear differences (witness the youtube comments). Could be they have more sensitive ears than I do. Could be they're fooling themselves.

John

[Tal_175]

I don't hear any differences. I tried listening without watching, and in some cases (where there was less of an obvious pause between guitars), I did not detect that he had changed. I'm imagine others will say they hear differences (witness the youtube comments). Could be they have more sensitive ears than I do. Could be they're fooling themselves.

John

I also didn't hear a difference between the two maple necks (one with rosewood fretboard). I think I heard a subtle difference with the mahogany neck. But I agree with the guy who did the tests that differences with body woods were more significant. That was a separate test that I linked in the original post.

[Tal_175]

To put things in context, the title of the thread should've been wood makes a difference in tone, whether it matters or not is debatable. When it comes to acoustic instruments, the tone you get from the construction is all you got. For example there aren't too many things one could do to make a very scooped guitar to sound balanced or fat.

With electric guitars not only differences are more subtle but pickup choices, pedals, guitar and amp controls make it possible to shape the tone a lot more. So may be it's a moot point but in my experience you do get a base tone from the acoustic sound of the electric guitars. To me it makes sense to start out with a base tone that's closer to what one wants to achieve.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Sorry but your questions are very basic and it would take a long time to get into all the details. Ampifiying a frequency is a relative effect in relation to other frequencies. It's a well known phenomenon called wolf tones:

"A wolf tone, or simply a "wolf",^[1] is a sustaining sympathetic artificial overtone that amplifies and expands the frequencies of a played musical note, and is produced when the original note matches the natural resonant frequency of the body of the musical instrument"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_tone

From that same article:



The remedy, damping a string, implies that that is where the resonance is actually making the noise (i.e., enhancing the frequency).

So if it's all subtractive, then can you identify how the frequencies are deleted? What qualities of wood attenuate which frequencies, and why?

A resonant body absorbs energy, and vibrates in sympathy to the prevalent frequencies. We all know that. That is not the same as asserting that different frequencies are so attenuated by particular materials that the human ear can hear the difference, especially after being processed from pickup to speaker.

I've seen too many people over at MyLesPaul fail KP's blind listening test to trust any claims like this without evidence.

[Tal_175]

From that same article:



The remedy, damping a string, implies that that is where the resonance is actually making the noise (i.e., enhancing the frequency). This quote of yours doesn't demonstrate that harmonic resonances add energy to any frequencies, only that near-matches are annoying enough to prompt remedies.

Where's the extra energy coming from to supply the amplification of a frequency as you say happens? There's no such thing as a free lunch. This is physics.

Of course there is no energy added. There is no magic. As I explained that's in relation to the other frequencies, wolf note sound amplified. The article also uses the term "amplified" to describe the effect. Don't get too hung up on that term. Obviously it doesn't mean suspension of the laws of physics.

[Tal_175]

Also note that amplify does not mean adding energy in the context of sound. Sound board of a piano or acoustic guitar amplifies the sound of the strings. That means strings are themselves very quiet, sound board translates the energy in the strings to the movement of the larger surface area of the sound board. Resulting in more air movement at once than strings themselves can achieve. No energy addition is implied but the sound is amplified.

[rlrhett]

To put things in context, the title of the thread should've been wood makes a difference in tone, whether it matters or not is debatable. When it comes to acoustic instruments, the tone you get from the construction is all you got. For example there aren't too many things one could do to make a very scooped guitar to sound balanced or fat.

With electric guitars not only differences are more subtle but pickup choices, pedals, guitar and amp controls make it possible to shape the tone a lot more. So may be it's a moot point but in my experience you do get a base tone from the acoustic sound of the electric guitars. To me it makes sense to start out with a base tone that's closer to what one wants to achieve.

I've been making acoustic guitars for twenty years. Each one I make has its own character and voice. Admittedly, these are not electrics. That said, rarely do they align with my preconceived notions of what the wood is going to sound like. So many factors are at play.

But let me stress that is NOT a bad thing. I love the fact that guitars have their own voice and personality. The first time I string up a new guitar is always magic. I have friends that make coffee tables or turn bowls in their spare time. When they are done, they have a bowl. I have this thing that speaks in its own voice. A silly as it sounds, it feels like it comes alive.

It is hard to pick a guitar just from specs. They have a tendency of thumbing their nose at your preconceived notions. If they were predictable you could just order up the cheapest one that has the specs you want and be done with it. You have to play them, fall in love with them, give them a name, find a place for them on your wall/rack/studio, etc.

Then, of course, you have to start your search for the next one.

[medblues]

Can you please provide a link to any one of these published studies you mention that shows body wood differences are not distinguishable in blind tests. Because I cannot find any.

This is what I had saved as a link, the various fora and youtube has a bunch of blind tests there are also published blind tests demonstrating psychoacoustic phenomena:

http://faculty.tamuc.edu/cbertulani/...SelfThesis.pdf

[medblues]

The guitars were not amplified. The tonal, pitched response (checked with a strobe tuner) was audible. The guitars were resonating at those pitches sufficiently to make the trem springs vibrate audibly. The strings were all brand new, from the same box. As to manufacturing variations, you may not be familiar with PRS QC.

Of course you are right, I agreed with you that body wood make a difference in acoustic sound. I still think without a strobe tuner and visual input, most people would have hard time discerning them in a blind test but we will never know the answer. I heard about QA/QC/QI of PRS but I doubt that they test for sonic (acoustic) consistency to the point that they discard guitars that look perfect and sound great but does not sound identical to a "standard" one.

[Tal_175]

This is what I had saved as a link, the various fora and youtube has a bunch of blind tests there are also published blind tests demonstrating psychoacoustic phenomena:

http://faculty.tamuc.edu/cbertulani/...SelfThesis.pdf

This is not a published research. It seems like an undergraduate project titled "Self study". Nevertheless conclusion of this thesis does not seem to suggest that it's a psychoacoustic phenomena. It says it found differences in tone, suggest further research to evaluate how well they could be heard (last sentence of the conclusion):


"Even though this study did find differences in timbre, it would be useful to research whether or not one couldactually hear the difference. Such research is outside the scope of this study; however, measuringthe ability of one to perceive these differences is necessary to evaluate how different two timbresmust be before they can be perceived as different. "

[Thumpalumpacus]

There also needs to be a clear and unambiguous causal relationship between wood species and tone, or timbre if you prefer, in order to support the videos upthread.

[jads57]

Even as Crazy as I am,especially about chasing gear. This is past the Mark of any use. Especially since the guys who are so anal about this don't even gig !

It reminds me of the old audiophiles who buy a record of a snare drum to show off their system,lol!