Rift sawn lumber for guitar tops

[Jerry D]

In a recent Acoustic Guitar mag, Dana Bourgeois attempts to explain rift sawn logs v quarter sawn, and I still don't get what rift sawn is. (And YouTube doesn't help, the videos there seem to have it confused).

Could someone clearly explain rift sawing so a dunce like me can understand it? (I understand quarter sawn).

[otis66]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rift_sawing

[Jerry D]

Thanks, Otis. Don't know why I didn't think of Wiki, I use it all the time.

[state-it]

Try this:

Quarter Sawn

Rift Sawn

[Jerry D]

Well, it's still confusing. Both methods look to me like the growth rings on the edges are perpendicular to the flat surfaces.

[Howard Klepper]

A few things:

The terms mean different things to a sawyer and to someone shopping for lumber, such as a luthier.

There are at least 3 different ways of quartersawing (for a sawyer); but only one meaning of "quartersawn" for a luthier

There are a bunch of drawings on the internet that show what luthiers call quartersawn wood as being "rift sawn."

For lutherie purposes, 'quartersawn' means cut on a radius of the tree, so that the annular ring lines are perpendicular to the broad side of the board. 'Flat sawn' means cut on a tangent to the tree, so that the rings are parallel to the broad surface of the board.

For lutherie purposes, 'rift sawn' means somewhere between quartersawn and flat sawn.