Wood for Guitar Bodies

Wizard · 2009-10-21T11:58:44+00:00

Hunted around locally for body woods. Have found a piece of Alder that is 50mm x 330mm x 3,050mm for R 1,100. This is enough to make 6 Strat bodies. None of the wood shops are keen on selling a piece just the right size. Would require them to cut a piece off the end of a plank. On the plus side this allows you to stuff it up 5 times before you get it right ?

AlanRatcliffe

MikeM wrote Clapton even transferred his neck from Blackie to Brownie (or the other way around).

Blackie is the original "Partscaster". Clapton bought a batch of six vintage Stratocasters from a Nashville store in 1970. When he got back to Britain, he gave one to each Steve Winwood, Pete Townshend and George Harrison and kept the three he liked best. He then took the parts he liked best from the three remaining Strats and assembled Blackie from those parts.

MikeM

Ah my bad yes ? Brownie was Clapton's first strat, and he transfered that neck to a Tele at a stage.. :-[

Wizard

Have now worked with Alder a bit for the first time.
A very interesting wood.
On the one hand it's light weight; and has a "loose" ring tone similar to perhaps pine or a lightweight ash.
Very different to the dense woods like rosewood; bubinga; maple or wenge.

On the other hand it has a much straighter grain and is physically more robust than pine.
Has a really nice colour.
I sanded an offcut and put on some Danish Oil. I really like the colour ... so that's what my strat is going to be ... Danish Oil'ed Alder.

I'm seeing a consistent pattern now amongst the popular solid body guitar woods - light weight, straight grained (but with a definite grain), with an open and loose tap tone.

I'm going to get lynched for saying this ... but it would be really interesting to see what sound would come from a guitar made of good old SA Pine.

Gearhead

Wizard wrote ... so that's what my strat is going to be ... Danish Oil'ed Alder.

Aren't you afraid of getting dents that way? I reckon the Alder bodies need some additional protection like hard lacquer whereas with Ash you can get away with the oil thing.

Wizard wrote I'm going to get lynched for saying this ... but it would be really interesting to see what sound would come from a guitar made of good old SA Pine.

Good old SA Pine comes in warped, warping and will warp imho.

Wizard

Aren't you afraid of getting dents that way? I reckon the Alder bodies need some additional protection like hard lacquer whereas with Ash you can get away with the oil thing.

Good insight - I have noticed how easily it dents.

Good old SA Pine comes in warped, warping and will warp imho.

Also true.

Wizard

Got this from a wood book of mine regarding Basswood:

It is fortunate for basswood that it is so well suited to woodcarving and patternmaking, as there is not much else to say for it.
Alternatives: Jelutong

AlanRatcliffe

In the right application it's not bad - look at Ibanez guitars. A basswood body with a maple cap is a nice combo (Suhr, Cort and others use this combo on occasion). Also, there is a difference between Asian and American basswood. The US grown stuff tends to have less mineral streaking, be slightly denser and more consistent.

From my own article on the topic:
"Basswood is a very lightweight, closed-grain wood with a consistent and tight grain pattern. The colour is whitish through yellow to tan, but sometimes has unattractive green mineral streaks. Better quality examples will be darker tan and consistent in colour throughout, but it is not a good looking wood for clear finishes. Basswood is a very soft wood which dents easily - this need not be a problem as harder finishes such as polyester are usually used to counter this. However, due to the softness, screw holes have a tendency to strip if overtightened. There also needs to be a reasonable amount of wood in front of the anchors of a two-stud tremolo system to prevent the wood from cracking and/or the studs from leaning forwards with extreme tremolo use. On the upside, the softness means it’s easy on tools and easy to cut, sand and finish. The softness of the Basswood attenuates both the high and extreme low frequencies. This gives it a pronounced midrange fundamental frequency response. Unlike Ash and alder, the tonal response is not particularly complex and the dynamic range is relatively limited. The reduced and smoother high end response helps offset the treble accentuation of floating tremolos and locking nuts. All together, this gives it an "up-front" tone, suitable for Metal and Rock music styles as well as for distorted lead tones, while clean sounds tend to be more sterile, somewhat lacking in character."

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