Where to get wood?

Gr1m

Hi guys,

Believe I only discovered this site now.

Anyways, can any of you guys (or gals) tell me where the heck to get suitable wood to use for an electric guitar body? I am harvesting two old smashed Fenders and building a custom guitar. I did a try in pine (yes I know but did not want to screw up expensive wood with inexperience - will see if it holds up) but I want to eventually do it properly with something a bit nicer.

Btw I am in Pretoria/Midrand/Randburg

PS. Where do you guys generally get parts? Is there a local source or only guys like stewmac and warmoth?

Regards

Ed

Gearhead

Ed, your questions have all been answered before on the forum. Your fastest answers are going to come from googling (site:guitarforum.co.za) and looking through posts.

The best place in your vicinity would imho be Silverton Timber Merchants, they are on the net but I'm not sure they are open over Xmas.

Gr1m

As the day was progressing and my post was stewing I found all the info I needed as you said in this forum. Sorry for posting before reading ALL the pages ? I only scanned through the first 2 initially.

flatfourfan

Gr1m wrote As the day was progressing and my post was stewing I found all the info I needed as you said in this forum. Sorry for posting before reading ALL the pages ? I only scanned through the first 2 initially.

I got 3 nice slabs of mahog at P&S timbers in koedoespoort in pta.......enough to do an explorer body for R800-00.

jeremy-Budgen

Ed

Just make shure that the wood is dryed out enough, as with all this rain at the moment, the woods are generally coming in at around 15-20 percent.

I buy a lot from silverton and after initial planning and jointing i leave my wood inside the house in a warm room for about 3 to 4 weeks depending on n the wood type to flash off a little. This wood would be used for a quick job, but i generally leave the wood foe about 1 year to make shure that is is dry enough, making shure that when i machine the body the weather conditions are good, no rail etc for a couple of days.

Also just make shure that you leave a little stock on the wood just in case it moves eg cupping etc.

Hope this helps

Jeremy

Gearhead

+1 on the year drying.
Never mind a couple of days of rain. Firstly, the humidity does not go up all that much when it rains (except during the rain, but Pretoria rain never lasts). Secondly, the thick pieces of wood lutiers use do not follow air humidity very quickly. Otherwise it would not take a year to dry out in the first place.

jeremy-Budgen

I live on a mealie farm in delmas, so the moisture here stays around for a long time, i have seen a panel of 25mm wood shrink 2-5mm in its width within 2 months, but the main bodies that i am buiding is laminated ones with maple as a central core and that keeps the wood from moving as well.

I find that if i were to get wood off the top of the pile then there is a good chance that it will be a little higher that that of a piece from the middle, so what i tend to do is to rotate the stack every month or so, so that we get an even drying throughout the stack, also i put what we call stackers in between each level of the stack, so that the moisture can escape from within as well, and i put heavy tractor weights on the top to keep them all straight.

I also find is that if i were to machine a body that is say 5mm over size with all cutting done, pickup routes and control cavities cut with some stock left to machine at a later stage, then i can 90% finish a body, and then leave it for the 3 to 4 weeks in a warm room, then you do get a sagnificant loss of moisture from the wood, to be able to finish it off for a quick job. especially on maranti that i use for cheaper guitars.