The Acoustic Guitar Forum

Go Back   The Acoustic Guitar Forum > General Acoustic Guitar and Amplification Discussion > General Acoustic Guitar Discussion

View Poll Results: What is tonal quality MOSTLY derived from ?
Wood 14 14.14%
Finish 0 0%
Construction 64 64.65%
All equally 22 22.22%
Jury is still out 4 4.04%
Multiple Choice Poll. Voters: 99. You may not vote on this poll

Reply
 
Thread Tools
  #16  
Old 06-14-2014, 07:02 PM
stormin1155 stormin1155 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Location: Des Moines, IA
Posts: 1,505
Default

A number of years ago the local woodworking club held a contest where each contestant got a single 8' 2x4 and could make anything from it they wanted. There were doll houses, model train, jewelry boxes, and the like. A local luthier made an acoustic guitar. Top, back, neck, braces... all of the wood parts came from that single construction-grade 2x4. I played it. It sounded really good. Not just OK... it sounded like a good high quality guitar.

Wood matters, but it plays a distant second in how a guitar will sound..
Reply With Quote
  #17  
Old 06-14-2014, 07:27 PM
bohemian bohemian is offline
Guest
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: State of Jefferson
Posts: 3,508
Default

Not on the poll choice list..

The player.
Reply With Quote
  #18  
Old 06-14-2014, 07:43 PM
Don54's Avatar
Don54 Don54 is offline
Charter Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Southern California
Posts: 979
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by bohemian View Post
Not on the poll choice list..

The player.
Where's the like button?
Reply With Quote
  #19  
Old 06-14-2014, 09:27 PM
DanPanther DanPanther is offline
Guest
 
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Planet Wave
Posts: 3,964
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by bohemian View Post
Not on the poll choice list..

The player.
External factors were not considered.
Does a player really add to a guitars tonal quality, or is the better player, just able to pull more of what is already there, from the instrument.
Does a better driver add to the performance of a race car, or just take better advantage of what is already engineered into the car ?
In both cases I have to say the latter.

Dan

Last edited by DanPanther; 06-14-2014 at 09:35 PM.
Reply With Quote
  #20  
Old 06-15-2014, 10:03 AM
FrankS FrankS is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Pittsburgh, PA USA
Posts: 887
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by 44Runner View Post
Below ruby beat me to the point I was going to make.



I thought Bob Taylor put all of this to rest with the Pallet guitar. Construction is the largest element in the awesomeness of a guitar. Wood comes second.
Pallets are made of wood that is not necessarily inferior tone wood. The wood used are scraps that cannot be useful for larger products or are visually unappealing. If Bob Taylor thinks the choice of wood is not an important factor, why does he use multiple tone woods for his guitars? Something is inconsistent with that.

Frank Sanns
Reply With Quote
  #21  
Old 06-15-2014, 10:30 AM
darrwhit darrwhit is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2006
Posts: 478
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by FrankS View Post
Pallets are made of wood that is not necessarily inferior tone wood. The wood used are scraps that cannot be useful for larger products or are visually unappealing. If Bob Taylor thinks the choice of wood is not an important factor, why does he use multiple tone woods for his guitars? Something is inconsistent with that.

Frank Sanns
I don't think there's anything inconsistent about a business owner making a point with a limited edition product like the pallet guitar, but also bowing to the demands of his target market: a guitar-buying public convinced that certain woods necessarily make a better guitar. If all he sold were guitars made from pallet wood, Taylor wouldn't be in business--not because the guitars were terrible, but because that's not what people are buying. If he lightly sprayed purple every otherwise nice-looking guitar , his only customer would be Prince, or the artist formerly known there-as.

Bob Taylor is a smart business man with a (very good) point to make, if you ask me. It's a pallet--there's something wrong about speculating whether or not the pallet just happened to be high-grade quartersawn tonewood. Even if they sifted through many pallets to find decent specimens of pine, it's a pallet! We're not talking about perfectly quartersawn, stiff instrument-grade spruce.

I'd take good construction miles ahead of anything else in those poll, with wood in a distant second.
__________________
||: "I don't need a fancier guitar. I need to practice." :||
Reply With Quote
  #22  
Old 06-15-2014, 11:06 AM
ruby50 ruby50 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Eastern Shore MD
Posts: 579
Default

Frank:
Good point, but as Darrwhit says, no one is demanding pallet wood guitars. Martin offers a Cherry guitar in their sustainable series, but I don't see the doors being beaten down by demand.

And if you read a bit about the pallet guitars you see that at least some of them have 6 piece tops of unknown species, and, of course, the backs are multi-piece and of mixed species. So if they sound good because of the wood, let's find out what those top wood species are and what is the best way to mix species for back and sides!!

Ed
Reply With Quote
  #23  
Old 06-15-2014, 11:10 AM
Teleman52 Teleman52 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: Texas
Posts: 3,334
Default

I think it just goes to show that taylor can put any price they want on any crap they want and people will buy it.

He built a guitar out of pallets and sold it for more than his regularly built guitars. Yes indeed he is a smart business man
Reply With Quote
  #24  
Old 06-15-2014, 11:30 AM
kydave kydave is offline
Guest
 
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: A Louisville transplant in Silicon Valley
Posts: 12,500
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Wade Hampton View Post
It's a combination of all those factors. Anyone who's ever been around amateur guitar builders has seen some of them take top notch materials and produce barely functional musical instruments out of them.

So it's design and execution as much as it is materials, in my opinion. Finish matters less, so long as it's been competently applied. If you slather on a half inch of marine spar varnish, yeah, that has an impact, but for the most part finish matters mainly in terms of how little it affects the tone.

Wade Hampton Miller
I think Wade nails my thoughts pretty well, so I'll just give a + 1 to what he already said.

Reply With Quote
  #25  
Old 06-15-2014, 12:00 PM
Guitar1083 Guitar1083 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2014
Location: Brooklyn, New York
Posts: 2,925
Default

Just a thought

If Martin builds a D-45 and it sounds bad would they sell it , our put it in the wood-chipper.

I vote wood
Reply With Quote
  #26  
Old 06-15-2014, 12:03 PM
FrankS FrankS is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Pittsburgh, PA USA
Posts: 887
Default

I agree with most all that has been said. Of course it can all get screwed up in the build and build is essential. What has not been answered though with the wood is a great looking and quarter sawn piece of Adirondack were to be used for a guitar, and it was a dull, and thuddy sounding piece of wood, so would the resulting guitar. Not the best build can change that.

Each is a key element to the build but each wood, finish, design, and build has its own limits but if you do not start with good wood, all of the rest, no matter how good, cannot a stellar guitar make.

Frank Sanns
Reply With Quote
  #27  
Old 06-15-2014, 02:54 PM
bohemian bohemian is offline
Guest
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: State of Jefferson
Posts: 3,508
Default

"External factors were not considered."

The player is not external, he/she is elemental..
just as a bow and player are to a violin.

No player... no sound.

Different players get different sounds out of the same guitar.


I have cheap guitars that rival any of the expensive customs I have had from "revered" makers. I firmly believe a great sounding guitar is rare and is not necessarily the luthiers cause. Elements just come together.

I have played plenty of expensive dogs from exalted makers.
Reply With Quote
  #28  
Old 06-15-2014, 03:36 PM
Guest 728
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Teleman52 View Post
I think it just goes to show that taylor can put any price they want on any crap they want and people will buy it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Teleman52 View Post
I generally don't like taylor guitars so I'm sure I wouldn't like that one, but I could be wrong and I'd keep an open mind if I played it

Sure you would.
Reply With Quote
  #29  
Old 06-15-2014, 09:10 PM
DanPanther DanPanther is offline
Guest
 
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Planet Wave
Posts: 3,964
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by bohemian View Post
"External factors were not considered."

The player is not external, he/she is elemental..
just as a bow and player are to a violin.

No player... no sound.

Different players get different sounds out of the same guitar.


I have cheap guitars that rival any of the expensive customs I have had from "revered" makers. I firmly believe a great sounding guitar is rare and is not necessarily the luthiers cause. Elements just come together.

I have played plenty of expensive dogs from exalted makers.
Apparently you did not read what I wrote. The capability of the guitar is there already, the player does not change that, all the player does is bring it out. IT'S ALREADY THERE.

You wrote; "Elements just come together." Would that be all by themselves ?
Whatever is put into the instrument, is already there, it's takes the accomplished artist to bring it to it's ultimate potential.

Dan
Reply With Quote
  #30  
Old 06-15-2014, 09:17 PM
Athana Athana is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2013
Posts: 1,547
Default

Everything PLUS & esspecially amount it is played.
Reply With Quote
Reply

  The Acoustic Guitar Forum > General Acoustic Guitar and Amplification Discussion > General Acoustic Guitar Discussion

Thread Tools





All times are GMT -6. The time now is 06:25 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
Copyright ©2000 - 2022, The Acoustic Guitar Forum
vB Ad Management by =RedTyger=