Please looking for comments BUT NOT Bob Colosi comments, LOL

[onewilyfool]

I have been seeing lately on guitar specs the term: "Synthetic Bone......" Does anyone know what this is made of? If it is synthetic, why call it "bone"???? If it is made from bone, why call it synthetic???? Please enlighten me as to what this is, thanks.

[jchabalk]

i think they generally refer to corian or tusq. Both are man made materials that have relatively similar properties to bone (for the purposes of nuts and saddles, not soup making ).

 

There's some more information here that you may find useful:

 

http://www.fretnotguitarrepair.com/nut_materials.htm

 

hope that helps!

[ksdaddy]

And one advantage to the synthetic ones is that when shaping and notching there's no chance of hitting hard or soft spots like when using real bone. Il suce l'âne to shape, layout and notch a nut and then hit a soft spot when making the final passes with the file and end up with a too-low notch.

 

Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.

[TheLiveSoundGuy]

I don't know the answer, so I'm not trying to be a smart a$$, or sarcastic when I say I would try to contact the Guitar company who is using the term "synthetic" in the descriptions you're seeing, and see what they tell you it is. A composition of some sort of modern chemical wonder I'm sure.

 

As for the Tusq saddle Gibson uses, it's a decent substitute material.

But on my Hummingbird, I pulled the tusq out and put in (dare I say it...) a Bob C vintage bone saddle, and seriously, WOW! I'll never go back to anything but bone again.

NOTE: I'm a strummer, not a picker, and a lot of the time I play so hard, I feel the guitar is going to implode.

Mind you, I don't beat my guitars, not a scratch on 'em, but I DO play the crap out of them!

 

Should you find out what "synthetic" is, I would really love to know.

[John Lee Walker]

One form of it is called cyclovac, which Fender has been using for a while. Forms well, files down like bone, and is easy to set up for injection molds. Gibson started using a version of nylon 6/4 for their nuts way back in the 60s. Nothing beats real bone, tho. I changed out the saddle on my J160E to bone a few years ago and, to be honest, I didn't notice any change in tone or feel whatsoever.

[ksdaddy]

I put a bone saddle in my J200 but the main reason was that when I got it, the saddle that was in it looked like one of those plastic ones in the parts box at the music store, the ones that don't fit any guitar on the planet, least of all a J200 with a wider than normal slot. I don't recall exactly, but it's wider then 1/8" so it was easiest to buy a chunk of rough bone and whittle a while. I also made the bone nut but that was my own choice, the stock one's spacing was way too wide.

[ballcorner]

I have no expertise regarding the exact chemical composition of the synthetic bone, but like ksdaddy - I have worked with synthetic and real bone for repairs and found the synthetic was much easier to work, had consistent density and responded well to shaping with a variety of tools.

 

As far as tone goes, I would suggest that a material which is exactly the same density everywhere has a better chance of providing consistent results than bone which can vary widely in density and hardness within a single piece.