A Question For Gibson and Independent Guitar makers

[Duende]

I have a technical question I wonder if anyone can help with? When choosing wood for a guitar, how do luthiers determine which mahogany for example, will sound better in the guitar they eventually build. Can an experienced luthier examine the material and make an accurate judgement on what will be a lesser or superior piece of wood for the tone of the guitar, or is it much more of a minefield than that and incredibly hit and miss?

 

If it can be judged so easily (and accurately) are we to assume that Gibson divide the wood for the custom guitars and the USA guitars into two separate areas; that would make sense if that is the case wouldn't it?

 

Matt

[Guest FarnsBarns]

Suspend it from string and hit it. You want it to go doing, not thump. For an LP, if its heavy, use a lite maple top to counter the lows with It's brightness, if its light, use heavy maple to tone down the highs.

 

This was imparted to me by a friend who is an amazing luthier.

[Guest FarnsBarns]

And yes, Gibson divy the wood accordingly with the lightest and most resonant mahogany going in r9s and the rest of the good stuff going in customs and historics and the very heavy and/or less resonant stuff going into weight relieved standards.

 

Edit: I don't want to imply that Gibson ever use poor wood, just that they do indeed rate what they have and use it accordingly.

[Duende]

Suspend it from string and hit it. You want it to go doing, not thump. For an LP, if its heavy, use a lite maple top to counter the lows with It's brightness, if its light, use heavy maple to tone down the highs.

 

This was imparted to me by a friend who is an amazing luthier.

 

That is interesting, cheers

 

Matt

 

 

 

[retrosurfer1959]

this pic has been around for a few years but shows at least one kind of sort