Guitar Wood Selection

Without a doubt one of the most important aspects of guitar making is wood selection. Even with great skills it will be very difficult if not impossible to make a great guitar with mediocre wood and other materials. As a guitar maker always striving to build the best sounding instrument possible, one must begin with the best wood possible. I encourage the inexperienced guitar maker to go around and look at as much wood and other material you can. Most suppliers will let you check out the wood in person. Look at the different grades and see for yourself what the differences are as far as visual, touch and the sound it makes as you tap it with your knuckle. Does the wood make a musical sound or is it a dull thud? Does the sound sustain and trail off or does it just die out quickly? If you are short on experience it may be a good idea to purchase only master grade material since it will be difficult at this point to find a real bargain in the lesser grades of wood. It is also probably best to begin building guitars with the wood combinations that have proven track records. In this way you will establish a solid foundation from which you will have a reference for later departures.

Developing Your Guitar Wood Intuition

Developing a relationship between the wood you are using and the results you are looking for is paramount to successful guitar making. Your intuition in guitar making is an important asset and it needs to be developed, or more accurately encouraged. Most people already have some ability for accurate observation using their senses - all that is needed is the confidence to listen and be guided by it. As your experience working with the material grows, you are unconsciously creating and storing a collection of information. This information will become the basis for the decisions you make as a guitar builder.

Guitar Wood Cuts, Grain and Selection

Knowing the havoc moisture can create in a piece of wood, we can eliminate some of the problems by using the proper cut. The growth rings of a tree are concentric circles centered on the pith. By slicing the log into quarters and then slicing off each face we have what is known as quarter sawn wood. Wood is considered quarter sawn when its growth rings are 60 to 90 degrees to the face of the board. By slicing the log from top to bottom, known as flitch cutting, the center slices are the only quarter sawn pieces. The growth rings flatten moving away from the center. Rift sawn wood is where the growth rings are between 45 and 60 degrees to the face of the board. The pieces near the outer edges are commonly known as flat sawn and have the familiar grain pattern along the face. Flat sawn wood has its growth rings 30 degrees or less with the face. Drawing shows the different sections of the log where the different cuts are taken from.

Choose Quarter Sawn Wood for Guitar Making

Quarter sawn wood is more dimensionally stable than any other cut of wood. It also has a very calm and pleasing appearance in its straight vertical grain, which runs parallel to the length of the piece vertical to the front and back faces. A true quarter sawn cut of wood will reveal ray flecks which are intricate little cross stripes running perpendicular to the vertical grain lines on the face known as silk (Pictured here on a cedar top). There is a much better chance, if properly cut, that quarter sawn wood will not warp or twist. As the moisture content in the air and wood changes, quarter sawn wood will change dimension to a greater degree at right angles to the grain lines. Hence, the piece will not change dimension in width as much as a flat sawn piece will. Almost all the wood used to build a guitar is quarter sawn.

We have all seen stunning looking wood used on guitars, backs and sides especially. Highly figured grain patterns make beautiful visual effects but be careful if selecting some of these, because highly figured wood can have inherent instabilities. Some wood which either is or approaches flat sawn can be quite striking but not recommended for use in guitars. Some striking figure is available in quarter sawn cuts, such as quilted maple. Maple is quite stable when quarter sawn and should not pose any problems. Crotch or burl figure should be avoided except for small decorative touches because of their tendency to crack.