Woods explained

[Bass Viking]

When I ordered a neck at Warmoth I chose bubinga/bubinga instead of wenge because the density and hardness were about the same, but bubinga's grain is closed (fine).
I can tell you that it's very hard and smooth, and heavy, so I recommend graphite rods instead of steel.
Never felt wenge.

My choice of Warmoth neck wood was based in large part on it not needing a finish. Hence, I've purchased wenge, bubinga, goncalo alves, and most recently roasted maple. I liked them all but the goncalo was my least favourite, less bright than the others and difficult to adjust with the truss rod. Wenge is my favourite, followed very closely by roasted maple. An then there's the fingerboard wood that adds its own characteristics.

 

[Killing Floor]

Tone comes from pedals. Wood is just to get you to buy a nicer guitar and the "fingers" talk is so you'll give all your money to Big Lessons.

 

[chadds]

I'd go back tomorrow if it was summer and no school.

"I'd go back there tomorrow except for the work I've taken on. Stroking the star making machinery behind the popular song." Joni Mitchell

 

[chadds]

People who didn't think the qualities of the wood mattered in electric instruments is how we got the 1970s.

We kept playing covers perfectly until the bars said wait we can pay one person less to play the actual music. Then they figured they didn't need actual musicians to make music either. Cue drum machines and now auto tune.

 

[stuntbass77]

Body wood, neck wood, fretboard wood, and overall mass have can a significant impact on the sound of solid body instruments. All of those element affect how the string vibrates. You can limit those effects by using a high-mass bridge which will tend to isolate the string vibrations from the body. Don't confuse the sound created by a hollow body with the effects damping characteristics of the coupled system of strings, body, neck, fretboard, hardware etc. all of which contribute to the way the instrument as a whole responds to vibrations. Those system vibrations affect the way the strings vibrate, which in turn is transmitted to the pickups.

^this^ There are no magical tone woods. The density of the wood does effect the sound. So one wood can sound the same as another if the density and flexibility is the same. I like the feel of raw woods like wenge, roasted maple, and others. I only have maple necks with rosewood finger boards at the moment. I do like a satin feel so if a neck has a high gloss I just use some OOOO steel wool or very high grain sand paper.

 

[arbiterusa]

Body wood, neck wood, fretboard wood, and overall mass have can a significant impact on the sound of solid body instruments. All of those element affect how the string vibrates.

Everything you wrote in you post is absolutely true. You'll be pilloried for it here.

 

[M.R. Ogle]

Yep. This.^^^^^

 

[akizh]

Hey all, I first thought that I should post this in the Dingwall thread but I thought I might get more opinions here.

Can anybody share their thoughts on body woods. Alder vs. Swamp Ash and fretboards: Wenge, Maple, Pau Ferro, Macassar Ebony, and Ziricote, necks: maple, 5 piece laminated maple and wenge.
Cheers.

I guess you're looking for ABZ vs AB1, correct?
Dingwall's body option is a bit tricky on these two models. ABZ can only be Swamp Ash body and satin finish; while the AB1 has Alder body as base spec and Swamp Ash as option, choosing Swamp Ash on AB1 will cost you much more than ABZ but that's the only way to get a AB with Ash body and gloss finish. So within these two models, do consider if you want satin or gloss finish on body (and the cost, of course).

On the fingerboard, if you want bright sound then choose maple, or just get wenge for slightly controlled treble and more punch, which is also a standard for all Canadian models.
Pau Ferro and Ziricote, personally I would say they are some rosewood-like sounding woods but still not the same. Pau Ferro has more glassy treble than rosewood, and Ziricote sounds a bit snappier. Ziricote and Ebony are rather rare to see on Dingwall, it's a bit risky to choose them on Dingwall if you are not familiar with them, cause you can't find any demo.

For neck woods, wenge neck has it's natural compression, which brings a lot of punch a can cut through heavy mix easily. But on the other hand, if you're not playing heavy music, it might be too prominent in a mix.
And don't afraid the pores on wenge neck like someone in this thread (who called that grain). Dingwall fills the pores and paint the wenge with satin finish, so it'll feels as smooth as maple neck.

 

[Turnaround]

Richard:

So when you're trying out new basses in a store, before they're plugged in, and some of them can be obviously louder than others, is this what's at work, and how do you infer it doing that to a plugged in performance ? Of course, pickups and hardware play into it, but would it being more 'live' translate to a more sophisticated blend of tone ?

Again, Thanks !

JW

When you get into a discussion about "tone" it gets very dodgy indeed. My idea of good tone can be vastly different from yours. And I do mean "vastly different". And when you add a qualifier like "sophisticated" it complicates the matter further.

In my case I pay attention to the way an instrument sounds unplugged as much as when plugged in. For me the more it speaks unplugged the more likely I will find the plugged-in response pleasing.

 

[sikamikanico]

If tonewoods didn't matter, then the same model basses would sound basically the same. They don't.
If toneswoods were predictable, then the same model basses with the same specs would basically sounds the same. They don't.

My take is, we're talking tendencies, or averages. Maple tends to be brighter than rosewood etc... But if you order a bass, or buy it sight unseen, you're just playing the probabilities, but won't know what it sounds like until you have it in your hands...

I suspect best luthiers may have the skills and abilities to predict from a plank of wood what it will sound like (tap test maybe?), but that's speculation on my part. They may also be just fooling everyone, for marketing...

 

[kevindahl]

I guess you're looking for ABZ vs AB1, correct?
Dingwall's body option is a bit tricky on these two models. ABZ can only be Swamp Ash body and satin finish; while the AB1 has Alder body as base spec and Swamp Ash as option, choosing Swamp Ash on AB1 will cost you much more than ABZ but that's the only way to get a AB with Ash body and gloss finish. So within these two models, do consider if you want satin or gloss finish on body (and the cost, of course).

On the fingerboard, if you want bright sound then choose maple, or just get wenge for slightly controlled treble and more punch, which is also a standard for all Canadian models.
Pau Ferro and Ziricote, personally I would say they are some rosewood-like sounding woods but still not the same. Pau Ferro has more glassy treble than rosewood, and Ziricote sounds a bit snappier. Ziricote and Ebony are rather rare to see on Dingwall, it's a bit risky to choose them on Dingwall if you are not familiar with them, cause you can't find any demo.

For neck woods, wenge neck has it's natural compression, which brings a lot of punch a can cut through heavy mix easily. But on the other hand, if you're not playing heavy music, it might be too prominent in a mix.
And don't afraid the pores on wenge neck like someone in this thread (who called that grain). Dingwall fills the pores and paint the wenge with satin finish, so it'll feels as smooth as maple neck.

Actually I'm interested in a Super J. Thank you for your post

 

[Greenstreet]

.

Alder and ash were chosen by Leo Fender because they were plentiful and cheap...

This gets thrown out in these ridiculous arguments all the time as if it were somehow "proof" that the choice of wood has no bearing on the voice of the instrument. It sounds good, at least on the surface, as long as you don't look too closely...

First off, Leo Fender was an engineer, not a musician. He approached his designs accordingly.

Even so, he quickly discovered that the choice of wood has a distinct impact on how the instrument sounds, which is why he specified the type of wood to be used for each instrument.

The price and availability of different wood species fluctuates frequently and regularly. If these were the only concerns, he wouldn't have specified which species to use for each instrument. He would've left that decision up to the purchaser at the factory, trusting them to procure whatever is cheapest at that particular moment.

By specifying a particular wood, he effectively prevented the factory from procuring whatever was cheapest at the time.

To say that Leo Fender's choice of wood was based purely on economics is simply not accurate.

Gibson chose mahogany for similar reasons.

Actually, Gibson chose 1 3/4" thick mahogany body with a 5/8" maple cap for their Les Paul bodies. The maple cap added considerable expense to the manufacturing of the instrument.

Not only did it add one more wood species to be procured, adding to the overhead, money tied up in inventory, storage requirements, etc, it also more than doubled the amount of time and labor required to make the body.

Instead of just cutting the body out of a single piece of wood, the body was cut out of mahogany, then what was effectively a second body was cut out of maple, then they were planed, glued, clamped, allowed to cure, sanded until the two pieces were aligned exactly, and so on.

None of these things were done in order to save money, and they weren't done for aesthetics, since the guitar was only available in two finishes, both solid colors; black or metallic gold.

The decision to add considerable cost to the manufacturing of the guitar was based on one thing, and one thing only: the impact of the choice of wood on the voice of the instrument.

To suggest otherwise is just not true.

The idea of a "tonewood" is based more on tradition than anything else...

Yes, and that tradition is based on hundreds of years of experience with which woods sound best in musical instrument applications.


.

 

[Fernando Costa]

The physical characteristics of the materials with which the neck, body, fretboard, frets and bridge are manufactured, as well as the body and neck joint and the entire construction technique, work as a frequency filter. It's a system.

Any vibration in this "system" causes the strings to vibrate less at the same frequency, and the bass will have a lack at that frequency. As the frequency bands that the "system" vibrates are several and small, the frequency bands in which the strings vibrate with less intensity are also several and small. It's a complex filter, so each instrument has its own timbre.

It's difficult to immediately notice any change in timbre when changing only one part of this "system", especially if the material has similar characteristics. Still I think the pickups, the electronics, the strings, the setup and the musician's affinity, style and technique with the instrument make the most difference.

 

[Rnr..........4]

Alder has a round, even sound. Swamp Ash is a bit more trebly. Especially with a maple fretboard.

I did have a Warwick swamp ash with an Ovangkol neck and Wenge fretboard. It helped even out the treble sound a bit. I ended up selling it because the MEC sound was sometimes too nasal-y. I did like the passive sound which had the Warwick growl but I ended up getting a Sandberg so it went.

 

[spatters]

Yes, of course they obviously do, and if you can't hear the differences, you have a tin ear and should not bother calling yourself a musician, and please don't ever go into business as a luthier.

In a blind listening test, people can't even tell the difference between a Jazz and a Ric 4003.
Ear Test: Can you tell the difference between a Fender Jazz and a Rick 4003?
Opinions were evenly split until the answer was revealed, likely because the differences were so subtle -- and these are two completely different basses with different pickups located in different places along the string, each of which factors will affect the tone much more than wood choice.

Go listen for yourself.

 

[marchone]

I leave it to the luthiers who build the instruments, whether a big company like Fender or a small outfit like Sadowsky.

They simply know more than I do. If I were to be asked which woods were used on any of my basses I'd have to review the specs.

 

[dkelley]

Wood is part of the natural growth of trees. If it's hard enough and strong enough yet not TOO hard or TOO strong, then it's suitable for making into solid body instruments. If making ACOUSTIC instruments, spruce and maple matter. If making solid body instruments, far more choices are available, and yes they do affect the sound since the pickups, which are mounted in the wood, are moved in sync with the resonating wood from the strings vibrating, and the strings vibrate on the bridge and nut which are attached to either end of the big wooden instrument, making the entire experience quite intertwined.

The tonal differences are not HUGE, but they DO exist, as has been proven many times.

 

[groovepump]

In a blind listening test, people can't even tell the difference between a Jazz and a Ric 4003.
Ear Test: Can you tell the difference between a Fender Jazz and a Rick 4003?
Opinions were evenly split until the answer was revealed, likely because the differences were so subtle -- and these are two completely different basses with different pickups located in different places along the string, each of which factors will affect the tone much more than wood choice.

Go listen for yourself.

Ha! Ive seen this before. All this talk about microscopic tonal differences is purely academic. We all EQ at the bass and at the amp, totally obliterating any tiny differences in wood type, or thickness of paint finish, etc. And then, at the gig, we sometimes need to EQ in the band to be heard through insane drummers, room acoustics etc. Everyone does it, and in the end, the wood tonality is lost in the real world signal path from amp to speakers, and the dozen pedal gadgets, etc. Woods "do" affect acoustic
instruments, however. You can easily hear the differences in woods used in Cellos or Double basses. And you can hear the difference in the same cello or DB played with bows of different wood types.

 

[themickster]

Play some basses in a shop and pick one you like. I chose an Aria, as it was the only right-hander still in a shop that was shutting down. I went for an Ibanez SR300E for how well it played where the jack socket is, its price and lastly the colour. An SR600E came two years later, when I wanted a higher-range bass with all the same thoughts as for the 300. Woods didn't come into it at any time.
The 600 pickups are Nordstrand Big Breaks - split coil in a single coil housing - and the 300s have humbuckers. Placement for the Breaks is nearer to the neck. The outcome is that the 600 has more treble than the 300, when the treble knob is on boost.

 

[el murdoque]

The problem with wood is that no two pieces are alike.
The next problem is that it is close to impossible to do a real A/B comparison because the sound of a bass is the sum of a lot of factors. If you want to compare the sound of a body, you could build two identical bodies with different woods and then transfer the neck, bridge and electronics from one bass to the other.
However, you would need to make sure that among others:
-The neck joint is absolutely the same on both bodies
-The pickup height is identical, same as the action
-Whoever plays the bass plays exactly the same

because even the smallest difference in those will have an impact on the sound, too.

But that's the beauty of it: Since it is so hard to approach the topic in a scientific way that actually yields results that are worth something, there is ample room for both speculation and belief.
You can build a great bass with woods that are generally considered poor (see Musicman).
Would it be even greater if built with woods that are generally considered superior? Speculate at leisure

One important point is, however, that lots of people consider the sound of the electric bass guitar as the result of a system that consists of not only the bass itself, but factor in the amp, too.
Once you have gain, EQ, compression and filtering in place and set to your taste, the sound of the wood itself plays an even smaller role than it did before.