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Our tedious friend is mistaken in a great many of his assertions but the argument from authority is a terrible logical fallacy and we should be wary of invoking it.
Been there done that got the T-shirt.
Deal with the rocklite first, I think I was one of the first to try it on a Les Paul, absolutely nothing wrong with it except it didn't sound like ebony, but it did sound like rosewood. So, rocklite is off the menu, I'm hoping that they will come up with a rosewood substitute as they have the sound now they need the look.
About 25 years ago. It wasn't that easy to get hold of the American hardwoods, Swamp Ash, Red Alder, you could get American White Ash, European Ash and European Alder. The White Ash was actually very good but also very heavy, I also believe this is the Ash that Fender used originally in the early fifties. European Alder sounded exactly the same as American Red Alder but it didn't look as nice, same colour, but no obvious grain pattern and heavy. European Ash had a great sound but far too heavy for most people. Like many other builders I was always trying out different woods that were easily obtainable.
Oak I tried several times to make necks out of but it was horrible to work with, plus it always felt dead as a neck wood. As far as making bodies out of it again it was a dead, didn't seem to add anything to the sounds but I would say it took tone away. I did make a body out Beach but again it seemed dead, I must admit I didn't try to make a neck out beach which possibly I should have done.
Sycamore is a tone wood, in particular for classical instruments violins etc well most bowed instrument almost certainly have a Sycamore back and sides called fiddle back. But unfortunately as a solid body I will call it dead, plus it's also very heavy. Burns guitars used Sycamore for all there bodies and necks and still do if made in the UK I believe. A post I done a few months ago showed a couple of Burns Marvin's I made for them they were Sycamore. I do use Sycamore, particularly for Les Paul's caps as I think the very white fiddle back takes colour better than the American maple. I also use Sycamore acoustic backs to put on the front of F hole Telecasters and drop top guitars and basses.
As I said at the beginning of this piece, been there done that and doubt if I ever do it again, waste of time and money.
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This is all reminding me of coffee...
Theres so much coffee out there its stupid..
I think most people will agree that real coffee is better than instant... Then some people take it further by saying no no, its only good if you grind fresh beans yourself and anyone who doesn't, doesn't know real coffee.. Then you get people who say you cant buy good beans from normal shops so they buy the really posh boutique stuff online and they will say, you don't know real coffee until you have tried this... Then it goes even further where people buy beans that have been eaten by an animal and shit back out and they will say, you haven't tasted real coffee till you have tried that... and then you get the people who still drink instant and don't give a shit.
Its all still coffee. Just drink what you like and be happy.
(its a good thing theres no such thing as vintage coffee )
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Ah but there is, I have a cuppa here from this morning! Just heat it up!
Wasn't it Aria that made a lot of guitars from Oak and stuff?
Either way thanks for reply stating your experiences with various woods.
As has been pointed out previously, this is not an academic paper, just an undergraduate project. The only safe conclusion to be drawn from this study is probably the fact that the differences in the frequency spectra are much smaller for the electromagnetic pickups than a microphone.
The only proper academic study of this topic is this one, which found no differences between 9 wood types. As Karl Popper pointed out, one disconfirmation is all that is needed to disprove a hypothesis.
Edit. I have tried to post again just now, and once again I just got a message telling my that my post needs to be approved. Who knows, it might appear in another 24 hours, or it might not. Whatever, the difficulty this causes pretty much shuts me out of the debate, which I guess was the intention. Oddly, the posts I flagged for personal abuse (telling me to 'fuck off' and so on) have not been moderated and are still up. Oh well, at least I better understand how this place works now!
I still seem to be able to edit my posts, so here are a couple of responses to what has been said whilst my post was awaiting 'approval'.
Whilst there can be a problem getting free access to some journal articles, the abstracts are pretty much all available on line, can be accessed through various academic gateways or the publishers own sites, such as Elsevier's Science Direct, and so on. There are also a growing number of open access journals these days, sources such as academia.edu and I also have access to a wide range of number journal subscriptions through my workplace.
I really doubt the claim that there are any, let alone 'many more' peer reviewed academic articles out there which show that 'tone wood' in solid body electric guitars really does work. I would love to be proved wrong. Anyone up for the challenge?
As to the claim the paper above is of no use because it is in Portuguese, just use something like Google translate.
Physicae certainly seems to be peer-reviewed. As to the department where the research was done, here is it's home page.
http://www.luteria.ufpr.br/portal/
All in all I would say that the above paper is the most credible piece of research we have showing that 'tone wood' in electric guitars is a myth. Of course, this won't stop some from preferring to cherry-pick material from an undergraduate project, or even less credible sources, arguing that a small difference on a spectrum reading somewhere somehow validates their belief. This is just the way people are - ready to uncritically accept almost any piece of 'evidence' that supports their view, but subjecting anything that undermines their view to the most rigorous examination possible, rejecting on almost any grounds that can be dreamed up, no matter how robust the overall conclusion.
OK, if the 'tone wood' effect is real, the it must relate to some real physical properties of the system. So how would 'responsiveness' be described in the language of physics? You agree that the term 'resonance' is not the right one, so what terms should we use. 'Mojo' is not good enough.
Does anyone actually disagree with this?
Can we please get back to discussing sensible things, like Brexit, whether god exists and is Elvis really still alive?
Your life will improve when you realise it’s better to be alone than chase people who do not really care about you. Saying YES to happiness means learning to say NO to things and people that stress you out.
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I've got another bit tucked away that could either make a slim guitar or bass body some time (it's 35mm thick) or perhaps I'll add a top to it.
not one person has mentioned that different types of wood look sexy as f@!*
I just cannot be arsed to help flog this dead horse of a thread.
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Also, was it peer reviewed? Is the Universidade Federal do Paraná a leading academic institution in this area? Was the experiment well designed? What were the criteria for determination of a significant difference? Etc.
I'd love to be able to read this paper but sadly can't speak Portuguese.
We've had a good discussion but I now think we're reaching the end of what you can discover from internet desk research.
It would make an interesting phd project for someone though.
To close. If there really are 'many more' academic papers out there showing that 'tone wood' in solid-body electric guitars really does have an effect, then I would love to read them. There you go, prove the case! Anyone up for the challenge? I have already done all I can to try to find an definitive answer.
I don't think you're taking this seriously enough.