I wouldn't worry about it. There are plenty of Fender necks 30, 40, 50, 60 years old with no graphite or steel without problems.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Graphite bars or Quartersawn? Which is better?
- Thread starter darwin-bass
- Start date
In a store I recently tried a new Fender American Standard P (with the Custom Shop pups) and then a true Vintage P. The Am Std to my ears had a noticeably brighter tone and didn't capture the classic P tone I was after. To be fair, I'm not sure if was the graphite reinforcement or high mass bridge or the wood density or wood newness in the Am Std. In any case, my takeaway is that better, more modern construction techniques won't always get you the sound you want, even if they are effective at solving the problems they were designed to solve. So the answer to the original question might be "neither" for me in some cases.
Doug Parent
Supporting Member
I've had Warmoth necks that were downright dull sounding, but that was wenge/ebony compared to maple/maple. I think the wood combo lends the major voice, perhaps the steel bars do lend some brightness but not to any degree that made it a deal breaker compared to the bullet proof nature of those necks stability wise. Just my take.
There's more than one way to build a great neck. I have an old one piece Maple neck on my 74 P that's nails, my old Dingwall 9 piece Maple with graphite stiffening just doesn't move, every note seems to jump off the fretboard night after night, regardless of temperature or humidity. Whether it's wood selection, careful construction, luck or some combination of the three is going to vary but results don't lie.
If I were the OP I would ignore the specifics and choose the bass with the neck that felt the best, also taking into account which bass sounds better.
If I were the OP I would ignore the specifics and choose the bass with the neck that felt the best, also taking into account which bass sounds better.
How much strength does the graphite bar actually add to the neck? I've never held one. They don't appear to be all that stiff in the vids I've seen. Why not just go a step further in the process and use steele reinforments?
I've tweaked so many necks. I'm beginning to think it doesn't really matter all that much if they're quartersawn or not. They all react the same way with a truss rod adjustment.
I've tweaked so many necks. I'm beginning to think it doesn't really matter all that much if they're quartersawn or not. They all react the same way with a truss rod adjustment.
Looks to me like standard drum veneer plywood turned into a plywood neck. I'm surprised that there aren't more necks like this out there. Drum-style maple plywood should make a dynomite neck. The deal with plywood is you run the grain at 90 degrees in each layer which makes it much more stable than even quartersawn. And as you know, maple ply drums have excellent tone and sonic characteristics.
Personally, Graphite necks are my all-time favorites both for tone and stability. But then I love the feel of a graphite neck, but some people just hate that cold plastic feel.
I've got a Squier PJ bass and a MIM Fender Jazz V that have extremely stable necks and they are just as they came from the factory, no graphite or rods of any kind (except the truss rod). So I'm sure some of it is just pure luck. On the other hand my Conklin sometimes becomes completely unplayable without a truss rod adjustment with a change in the weather...so spending a bunch of money doesn't always automatically give you a stable neck.
I'd say maple plywood WITH graphite rods would seem like THE winner. Not only would have the stability, strength, tone, and uniformity of maple plies, but you'd have the added stiffness of graphite which would allow a much thinner neck and finally, you'd have a neck with a wood feel rather than a cold plastic feel! Win-win-win!
I agree that either neck, flatsawn with graphite bars vs quartersawn, is a crap shoot at the end of the day.
To the OP: IMO, and obviously, if it all possible, try as many of both basses you're interested in before you buy. I'm confident if you do this, you'll find a keeper.
In regards to dead spots, none of the basses I own with graphite reinforced necks, most of which are multi-laminated, are 100% free of dead spots; rather, their dead spots aren't as obvious or glaring.
To the OP: IMO, and obviously, if it all possible, try as many of both basses you're interested in before you buy. I'm confident if you do this, you'll find a keeper.
In regards to dead spots, none of the basses I own with graphite reinforced necks, most of which are multi-laminated, are 100% free of dead spots; rather, their dead spots aren't as obvious or glaring.
Yeah exactly! Usually I'm better than that semantics-wise
We inlay the carbon from the rear, so if you get a neck with a maple board, we actually never even take the board off an put it back on. It's one continuous piece.
So far my Ibanez SR1400's neck is very stable. It has the "Atlas-4" neck with 5-piece wenge/bubinga construction and KTS titanimum rods. Temperature change doesn't seem to affect it.
Bob
Bob
Turnaround
Commercial User
"Quarter sawn" and "flat sawn" are terms that refer to the orientation of the growth rings of the wood in relation to the larger surface area. The fibres are the same in both cases, and studies have shown there is no strength differences between the two sawn boards.
There can be some increase in structural strength when pieces are laminated together though. But laminating flat-sawn with quarter sawn pieces introduces other structural problems as was found out in the aircraft industry when wing spars were made of laminated pieces. A study of catastrophic failure of laminated spars revealed that there was a higher risk of failure when flat sawn and quarter sawn pieces were used in the makeup of the spar. This had to do with the differences in expansion/contraction rates of the radial and tangentially cut wood. The difference caused additional internal stress in the finished product that lead to failure of the part. This information was published as long ago as the late 1940's by the Forest Products Laboratories in Canada.
So there's a "skunk stripe" on the back, then?Yeah exactly! Usually I'm better than that semantics-wise
We inlay the carbon from the rear, so if you get a neck with a maple board, we actually never even take the board off an put it back on. It's one continuous piece.
We spent time here in the shop doing basic strength tests, taking a length of maple that was 1"x 1" and 12" long, then hanging a 10 lb weight from the end and measuring the deflection. There was a measurable difference between flat and quarter sawn of approximately 1/10th of an inch. This was done at least 4 times with different "samples" of rock maple, and each showed the same (within 1000th of an inch) results. May not be fully scientific, but it seems a reasonable result.
Turnaround
Commercial User
Well, to be fair, the study I was quoting is a little dated. But I have to say that the tests performed were extensive. The resulting publication runs to over 350 pages with 30+ pages of tables showing consolidated test results. The tables cover things like volumetric, tangential and radial shrinkage, work in bending in.lb/ per cu.in., impact bending, modulus of elasticity, compression stresses, hardness, cleavage (splitting strength, nothing to do with v-cut dresses), tension perpendicular to grain, and on and on. It's been my wood bible for quite a few decades. I have never found another publication like it.
For a particular species of maple the tests showed that there was a bending differential between the radial and tangential planes a tad less than 10%, but the wood was about 10% harder on the tangential surface than the radial one (other species were similar, but not identical). Shear strength parallel to the grain was about 5% better on the tangential boards. However, the results were not identical when comparing air-dried to kiln dried wood. So one has to be careful about the use of the term "strength". And a bass neck is subject to compression forces as well as bending forces and so a generalization about tangential vs radial strength gets rather dodgy. There are other factors that are more important for neck construction - density, drying technique and thoroughness, case hardening, tooling, grain orientation (runout), type of glue used, etc. etc. etc.
I am not doubting your test results. I'm just saying there is more to the term "strength" than the amount a bend a static weight induces in a piece of wood.
Just for fun, try a little experiment using the same setup you describe above. But instead of comparing the radial flex to the tangential flex, turn the test piece over, so what was the bottom face is now on top. It is likely you will find that the wood does not flex to the same degree. The difference is small, but since you are measuring to 1000th of an inch, you should be able to see it. Damn trees - they are so inconsistent.
That's exactly why Stradivarius preferred the wood from trees that had grown very slowly during the "mini-ice-age" era - rings much closer together, much more consistent in grain and tonal behavior. There are still people walking through those same woods looking for good wood...
More or less. I played around with an Ex Factor once a loooong time ago. I don't think that counts for anything though.
I didn't say it WAS a single piece, I have absolutely no experience on which to base such an opinion. I have, however, seen riffsawn wood that looks very similar...that's all.
