Snakewood for a fingerboard/tailpiece?

[ThomClaire]

I'm just curious, would it be do-able to use snakewood instead of Ebony for the fingerboard and tailpiece? I don't know too much about it's qualities but I was fantasizing on a purely aesthetic level and thought I'd ask.

[Means2nEnd]

Not sure about a bridge but here a great example with a video in it about the wood. It's supposed to be harder than ebony.


http://www.warwick.de/modules/produk...ID=24092&cl=EN

[VegasGutPlucker]

In my experience snakewood isn't a great tonewood. It's too heavy and ends up sounding dull. For my ears I like african blackwood better than ebony (too glassy), but ebony better than most other rosewoods. Heavy isn't always better, especially in the case of the oilier woods like lignum vitae. They end up choking the sound. Stiffness is what we need, and the rosewoods especially African Blackwood excel at this.

[james condino]

While snakewood could be used for the fingerboard and tailpiece, the main consideration would be that a board large enough to make those would wind up costing more than a nice carved bass. It is VERY expensive and generally only comes in small sizes.

Vegasman, that is a confusing post. You like African Blackwood better than ebony and ebony better than most other rosewoods, but then the rosewoods and African blackwood, Dalbergia Melanoxylon, which is actually a true rosewood, are better.... African Blackwood is also a nightmare to use because of the high oil content. It will gum up any of the power sanding tools in the first pass- thickness sander, spindles, discs- worse than Brazilian Rosewood. I figure about $50 extra worth of sandpaper just for a little mandolin build.

I know a number of builders, myself included, who have developed allergic sensitivities from using African Blackwood over the years and can no longer use it. I've always wanted to try it for a bass fingerboard and tailpiece but had visons of poison ivy / oak like reactions every time I played the bass.

j.
www.condino.com

[VegasGutPlucker]

I like Melanoxylon better than most other rosewoods I've tried, I find it to be a superior rosewood, sorry for the confusion. I've found the oil content to be low in the pieces I've used, or at least manageable. Was actually far easier to work on the lathe for my endpins than all other rosewoods. Maybe I just got good pieces?
I also don't seem to have much aversion to woods, yet, especially cocobolo which I hear is one of the worst.
Ebony, on the other hand, is the devil's nose candy. That mess gets everywhere! But based off my (very limited) experience it makes a better more stable fingerboard material that the (non melanoxylon) rosewoods.

[robobass]

I was thinking that. All other issues aside, the cost of a DB fingerboard blank in snakewood would be ìncredible. Anyone know what that 6-string fretless slab in the video goes for? Of course you could always glue a few smaller pieces together...

[SneakyJak]

I was thinking that. All other issues aside, the cost of a DB fingerboard blank in snakewood would be ìncredible. Anyone know what that 6-string fretless slab in the video goes for? Of course you could always glue a few smaller pieces together...

around 200 by the looks of it

https://www.gilmerwood.com/search_re...ds=guitar+bass

[robobass]

Originally Posted by SneakyJak

around 200 by the looks of it

https://www.gilmerwood.com/search_re...ds=guitar+bass

I was wondering what that Warwick bass costs, actually. That Gilmer site has lots of snakewood boards but none are long or wide enough for a bass FB. Prices are lower than I expected.

[WarwickOfficial]

We use snakewood on both fretted and fretless electric basses (my personal bass has a snakewood fingerboard), however, we've found that it does not work well for EUB fingerboards due to the radius of the neck and issues with cracking. As far as sound goes - its tone is spectacular, with sustain like nothing else we've heard. Steve Bailey wouldn't use anything else after being turned on to snakewood for his electric fretless signature model. Thanks!