Actually,
Emmett Chapman over at Stick Enterprises has done extensive research on just this topic. And his conclusion was that the different woods made little to no difference to the tone.
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Actually,
Emmett Chapman over at Stick Enterprises has done extensive research on just this topic. And his conclusion was that the different woods made little to no difference to the tone.
In conveying that information as you have done it becomes an anecdote because we have no way of quantifying what you are talking about.
Having said that, my view is that any study you could possibly be referencing (and there are numerous other well known and respected luthiers who have explored the same question) is going to be many orders of magnitude short of what I believe needs to be done to determine to what degree the material composition of the bass plays a role in tone.
It is that unknowable "magic" which keeps this debate rolling along. It is a thing that nobody will ever prove nor disprove, yet it will always be debated.
In the history of the world a large group of non-scientists arguing a scientific matter has led to the establishment of a scientific fact exactly zero times.
It could be proven if it was important enough to fund research on it. It is probably very easy to solve conclusively. The problem is that it isn't valuable information.
I believe what DigitalMan is saying is true. However, since I have quite a bit of experience in doing large scale simulations, I do think he is underestimating the compute power that would be involved.
For example, let's say I am going to solve a set of simultaneous equations in 2 variables. The slowest laptop in the world would be maximum overkill to accomplish that.
However, when one ramps of the number of simultaneous equations to a large number of variables (I am guessing that this could easily approach 500 variables), there is a tremendous amount of compute power involved. Even if you used a good number of very fast GPU's (up to 5 quadrillion FLOPS each - FLoating point Operations Per Second), the timeline could stretch out to years. To compensate, one would use a whole bunch of GPU's. Of course, you are adding a lot of cost there. To make matters worse, one of the limiting factors on cost becomes the amount of electricity that a very large number of GPU's would cost.
Of course, one could use "the cloud". Unfortunately, that can be even more expensive.
All of the options given current technology would more than likely be beyond the reach of even the largest instrument manufacturers. If there was at least one manufacturer who could afford it, their first question would be, "If we can prove what the best combination of materials and processes are, what would be the value of the increased sales?" If the delta in sales doesn't cover the expense of doing all of this, it simply won't happen.
I think our view on the required resources is similar, although your conclusion on how long the model would take to run is longer than mine. Also, I think running this task anywhere except in the cloud would be a non-starter. The cost of HPC on premise only makes sense for LLNL and their ilk. Now if we could get the fine folks in Livermore interested in bass tone wood instead of cold fusion in a bottle we would be cooking with gas.
Don't ignore the likelihood that the results could undermine any sort of historical or existing promotion. Imagine Fender announcing the research results and a rep saying:
Hey, you know how we've told you for years about how our choice of wood in our premium priced basses yields superior tone? Yeah, just ignore that going forward.
That would be like The Pope coming out and saying:
I've been thinking about this whole "religion thing" and I'm not sure I'm behind it.
What was he supposed to do? Say that body wood matters; oh, here buy my neck-without-a-body instrument. Sure, that's testimony. LOL.
Whoa. Let's not get too far off into the weeds on this modeling thing. The problem there is definitely NOT computing power. The elastic properties of wood, in general, are a 9x9 tensor, because wood is highly anisotropic; and those elements are complex, because there is both energy storage and loss. Which means you would actually need 162 measured values for the specific pieces of wood, just to get going. In fairness, some of those moduli values are probably a bit less important; but, that's the whole picture. Also, one would need spectral values, which would make the data set a good bit larger, but, still digestible. Some Mat Sci graduate students are going to have to be busy for a while compiling the necessary data set, or GIGO.
I'm pretty sure existing computational power wouldn't so much be challenged by that data set.
The bigger challenge would be making sense of the range of values that could be interpreted in any useful way at all.
Again, if you are looking for a simple test, try putting a replacement graphite neck on your bass, and see whether that affects the sound or feel you experience as a player. And then, get back to us.
Or, for fun, here is an all aluminum bass:
If you think it sounds just like an MTD or whatever, then great. Might be an option.
Guess it depends what "the question" is. If the question is whether or not materials of construction make a difference, then there are fairly simple ways to test the extremes. Before you launch into a materials modeling supercomputer project.
I'm pretty sure existing computational power wouldn't so much be challenged by that data set.
The bigger challenge would be making sense of the range of values that could be interpreted in any useful way at all.
Again, if you are looking for a simple test, try putting a replacement graphite neck on your bass, and see whether that affects the sound or feel you experience as a player. And then, get back to us.
Or, for fun, here is an all aluminum bass:
If you think it sounds just like an MTD or whatever, then great. Might be an option.
Guess it depends what "the question" is. If the question is whether or not materials of construction make a difference, then there are fairly simple ways to test the extremes. Before you launch into a materials modeling supercomputer project.
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I certainly don't disagree with you. Rather, I was thinking more about a complete sim that would take into account not just wood properties, but many other things as well (e.g., the type of glue used on the back on the fingerboard, the temp the glue when it was applied, the amount of glue used, the clamping force and the clamping time used to allow the glue to set, etc., etc., etc.).
I was thinking about a large scale sim so that processes that effect the outcome could be modeled as well. That is when one encounters a large number of variables. For example, the properties of maple might vary a significant amount based on the ability of stain/paint to seep into the wood as well as any stabilizing effect a particular stain/paint might have on the wood.
I should point out that my wife -- who is very wise -- says that I tend to overthink some things.
Well, being inquisitive is a good thing. But, in the field of investigation, the first thing folks tend to do is look for major vs minor effects just using simple tests to discard lesser factors. Sometimes the baby does get tossed with the bath water, which can be interesting; but, normally that's the approach.I certainly don't disagree with you. Rather, I was thinking more about a complete sim that would take into account not just wood properties, but many other things as well (e.g., the type of glue used on the back on the fingerboard, the temp the glue when it was applied, the amount of glue used, the clamping force and the clamping time used to allow the glue to set, etc., etc., etc.).
I was thinking about a large scale sim so that processes that effect the outcome could be modeled as well. That is when one encounters a large number of variables. For example, the properties of maple might vary a significant amount based on the ability of stain/paint to seep into the wood as well as any stabilizing effect a particular stain/paint might have on the wood.
I should point out that my wife -- who is very wise -- says that I tend to overthink some things.
- Apr 18, 2008
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I'm reminded of this instrument by Bas-Extravaganza called the McDonald's Balie. The website is no longer around and I can't seem to access it with the Internet Wayback. I had saved this picture long ago and I remembered reading the story. The luthier made this bass from a countertop from a McDonald's restaurant.
While playing, you will look like a Big Mac while Grimaceing your best bass face.
While you might be correct, it's of no help if it's already agreed that while wood matters, it's effect is subtle. Here, it's the minor effect that is of interest
Not sure what your point was; I was merely describing how more general R&D gets done.
As far as wood in an instrument goes, about all anyone can say in general is it matters more to some than others. @nostatic was simply laying out an observation he had relative to his perception with a couple of instruments. His thread is probably not the right place to debate the broader question.
