Official Luthiers Forum!

Tree man , chainsawed a large 20 in dia crabapple tree in our subdivision , the ants got it , it has some spalting , its hard red, and has interlocked grain Besides bridges have any of you used it for any luthier realted stuff. I checked on google and its great for bbq and turnings anything else ??. its sitting by the kerb 100 yards from us and its pouring rain . Thank you .PS that is one very cool chinese instrument in taiwan thanks for showing . we had some interesting foreign instruments in our shop in LA. a biwa, koto, oud, etc ,but there was very little interest back then in 1990 /s

Chih-Wei wrote:

"I made this in 2013 simply because I was given a beautiful gourd and I happened to have a BRW branch which was somewhat suitable for its neck. I build mostly classical guitars btw."

I think I remember you posting them either here or on the MIMF forum.

I also build some fun little 3 string instruments - stick dulcimers. They have diatonic fretboards and are tuned DAd. I use formica for the back and sides and spruce for the soundboards. They are surprisingly loud for the size of the soundbox.

Ahhh... I guess I did but I kinda forgot about it for some reason. Before I took it out to study tradition Taiwanese tunes last year, it was seldom played for years. I learned that the most important part of making music is the player.


Thanks for your kind words, bcombs510. Making nylon-string plucked instruments(other than classical guitars) helps me understand how things work the way they are.

A bridge is the most important brace of the soundboard, so I made this bridge from BRW and ABW scraps, plus a bit of BRW I grew. It was for my personal fan-fret five-string nylon mandolin.
DSC_1042 by Chih-Wei Liu, 於 Flickr

Domestic bridge woods I have used so far:
Pecan
Osage orange
Black locust
Persimmon
The last three were dyed black with aniline.

Good prospects, IMHO:
Texas ebony (my current favorite, no dyeing necessary)
Hornbeam
Hop hornbeam
Sourwood
Mountain mahogany (one of the hardest domestic woods)
Mountain mahogany is a small scrubby bush that grows in the Rocky Mountains. Fingerboard size clear pieces are hard to find, but bridge blanks are possible. It is not a true mahogany; I believe the name comes from the color of the wood. It is very dense and tight-grained, and will take a nice polish.

Next to my back yard grew a large black cherry, which had been struck by lightning twice, and harbored a colony of carpenter ants. When my neighbor had it cut down a few years ago, I ended up with most of the larger sections, which were up to 29" in diameter. This wood is like no cherry I have ever seen. Certain sections are extra hard and dense, measuring 53 pounds per cubic foot after it was dried. Those sections also have black veining and curl, making it resemble a rosewood or bubinga. Needless to say, I intend to use some of this harder cherry for bridges and fingerboards. The more normal wood from the tree will be used for backs, sides, and necks.
One of my ideas has been to build a guitar using wood only from my neighborhood. Over the years, I have collected several other hardwoods, including pecan, walnut, sassafras, dogwood, red maple, spalted hackberry, basswood, etc. Thanks to the tornado outbreak in 2011, I have some Norway spruce for the soundboard.

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John

John have you ever used apple /crabapple wood ?. Just cut up the main trunk into 4 quarters, this stuff is so hard , it dulled my chainsaw this monday. It was at least 20-22 in in diameter . I like the idea of a N. american wood build only !!!!

Apple makes a good bridge wood, as it's quite resistant to splitting. It varies a lot in density; sometimes quite soft and light, and other times dense and hard. This may have to do with the variety.

I've run into wood from time to time that had a significant amount of silica in it. It's common in some species, but apparently can happen in almost any. The worst I've run into is purpleheart. I had a BRW head plate once that had a black line in it that must have been about half sand: it actually nicked the plane I tried to use to smooth it off.

John was suggesting to build a guitar out of local neighborhood wood. I've been setting up to do the same out of wood from my property. Pics are pondorosa pine 34" diameter x 24", white oak 24" diameter x 36". Hope to mill them up for tops , b&s and braces. Ive got manzanita which is working for bridges,fingerboards, neck laminations and trim veneers. The rounds were cut 6 months ago. Any suggestions on milling? I've got 24" and 28" chainsaws and an 18" bandsaw.

This is my method for processing green wood. I have been cutting instrument wood for over 30 years now. At the very least, I saw or split the wood into quarters or halves right away. Otherwise, it will split along the bark during drying.
I generally saw hardwoods into boards that are 1" to 1 1/2" thick, then sticker and dry for a year or so. Then you can resaw it thinner without worrying about 'potato chipping' (warping). Softwoods like pine or spruce can be resawn into tops from day one....they will not warp as long as they are properly stickered. In general, soundboards are cut about 0.200" thick.
I cannot emphasize more strongly the necessity of stickering the wood immdiately after sawing, using dry sticks. If you don't, you can count on damage from warping and mold.

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John

I'd like to add a couple of suggestions to Mr. Arnold's sound advice. You need to seal the ends immediately or the wood will check (I hope it's not too late already) and get the bark off. Insects lay their eggs under the bark (cambium layer), this is particularly important with the pine. I lost a nice stack of Engelmann spruce billets due to leaving the bark on.

I do as john does, but leave my quartered logs with end grain sealer asap and then toss them into a sheltered dry spot in the garage . I do not resaw, after 1 yr or longer depending on the quartered piece, I start to resaw all the hardwoods we harvest after a lengthy drying process. For quarter sawn 4/4 stock from the mill , I will use dry stock 1in thick for stickers , but I prefer to resaw after 5 or more years when the stock is bone dry . We have very high humidity here in KC MO and cycles of very dry weather in the winter. When I have gotten thick pieces ofWRC I resaw those immediately and wrap them around tape WRC is very stable when dry and IMHO does not need stickering. On the other hand when I receive MO yellow cypress wood a soft hdwd . I sticker it asap as it goes wonky fast and moves a lot in the drying process. Experiment with what works for you with different woods and different climates. This is not rocket science its all about paying attention to ones local atmospheric conditions , weather, and available woods.

I've reduced a few trees to instrument wood, but not as many as John.

There are three main things that cause trouble when seasoning wood: uneven drying, differential shrinkage, and stuff that wants to eat it. Mold and bugs need a certain amount of moisture to live in the wood, so the faster you can dry it below the fiber saturation point the less trouble those things will give you. Also, light woods, like maple, spruce, and ash, tend to darken more the longer it takes to dry them. The way to get the wood to dry fast is to expose as much surface to moving air as possible. The problem there is that wood tends to lose moisture through the end grain very fast, while bark is more or less water proof. If the end grain dries too fast the end of the length of the piece gets smaller before the center does, and you get end checking. Once this starts it's hard to stop it. Finally, most woods shrink a lot more tangentially (parallel to the annual ring lines) the radially (perpendicular to the ring lines). If you see a lot of curvature in the ring lines on the end grain the piece is likely to cup across the grain, or check badly, so you need to get rid of that.

The process I've used, then, was to split the drums up into wedges as soon as possible after felling. For guitar or fiddle wood you lie to use quartered wood anyway, so a wedge that's 3" thick on the wide side is about right, depending on the size of the tree. I've gotten away with cutting a small log into quarters, but don't advise it.

Cut off the pointed end of the wedge where the rings curve a lot.

Remove the bark, also as soon as possible after felling, while it's still easy. This helps equalize the moisture loss from all the side grain surfaces.

Paint the end grain with something that will reduce moisture loss there. You don't want to stop it, just get it down to a rate that's similar to the side grain loss. I have found a couple of coats of latex paint to work just fine, and it sticks well to damp wood, too. I've heard of using Titebond.

Find a place outdoors that gets good air flow, but not full sun. Cross-stack the splits off the ground: old pallets are useful. That is, lay down a layer of pieces that run north-south, and then put the next layer across those, east-west. The pieces will only touch at a few points, allowing for good air circulation. Cover the top of the pile with a tarp or something similar to keep out rain and dew, but don't block air movement in and out of the sides.

Turn the pile over in a week or so. Check each piece carefully for signs of checking, mildew or insects. If a piece has checked on the end trim it back past the damage (all the way!) and re-paint. If you see a lot this may be a sign that your wedges are too thick. If you see mildew, scrub the spot with a 10% bleach solution and put that piece on the outside of the pile where it can dry fast. I've never had insect trouble this way, but I suppose you could use some sort of insecticide. That's not a long-term solution; drying the wood and keeping it dry is. After that turn the pile when you can; I'd say once a month for at least two months, but a lot will depend on the weather and climate.

Wood cut and stacked like this should be 90% to equilibrium moisture in six weeks or so, and past danger. It's nearly 'dry' but not 'seasoned'. That takes at least a year per inch of thickness, minimum; another good reason to make your wedges thin.

This is not gospel, but it has worked for me.

What great advice...should have had a separate thread for this one.
The ends were painted soon after cutting so hopefully they'll work out.
I have a chainsaw mill that will go to 26". Thinking about cutting a 3" wide billet through the core of the oak at the widest spot and then split or mill quarters if I can secure the log at the right angles.
Same with the pine but the first billet will be by hand.
Will peel the bark B4 trying to mill.
I've got about 100 5/8 x 5/8 x10" stickers cut out of old construction scraps. John, how far should they be spaced?

Thanks everyone,

Carl

I know american persimmon being a member of the diospyros genus has already been discussed, but something that I haven't seen mentioned yet is that sometimes it isn't necessary to dye it to get beautiful results. Very old trees can have a very narrow streaky dark brown and/or black heartwood that bears resemblance to Macassar ebony. I've never seen a piece wide enough to get a fully black board but you could do something cool with heartwood/sapwood contrast.

I used hickory one time. It seemed to work fine. You really have to be selective on the piece you choose to get tight even grain. It can vary a lot.

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Jason Moe
LaCrosse WI 54601