walnut guitar solid body and neck and ash tone

als427

any views on this a tone wood. thinking of a les paul or even a telecaster.
I have some very nice walnut at my workshop begging to be used but I am getting conflicting opinions on the tone it produces - some say warm and mellow others very bright- any help appreciated.
I can always chamber so weight not an issue.
Ditto , hard as vs swamp ash - excluding the weight difference is there any real tone difference between the 2 ashes?

earwighoney

Gibson made a walnut neck/bodied guitar, 'The Paul' which was originally out in the 70's and recently reissued. Quite a few videos on Youtube so that should give you some kind of idea to the tone. 

I've played quite a few acoustic guitars with walnut back and sides and it's one of my favourites; sounds somewhere between mahogany and koa. 

Roland

als427 said:

any views on this a tone wood. thinking of a les paul ... I have some very nice walnut at my workshop begging to be used but I am getting conflicting opinions on the tone it produces ... hard as vs swamp ash - excluding the weight difference is there any real tone difference between the 2 ashes?

Be prepared for the tonewood debate. A search will bring up a couple of heated discussions.

In summary, Acoustic guitars are very much influenced by the wood they are made from. That’s both the wood type, and the characteristics of the particular tree or log.

Wood has less effect on the sound of an electric guitar. The major factor is how stiff the neck is, and you can increase stiffness by slicing the neck blank in three and reversing the middle slice.

That said, walnut can make a nice looking and sounding guitar. So I, for one, am interested in what you do with it.

kizzer

I bought and did up an '82 Fender Bullet body and neck, the body being Walnut. I've never much believed in the 'tone wood' mystique of electric guitars, but I think it looks nice!

kaypeejay

Go for it and don’t forget to post loads of pics. 

andy_k

I have built my last few teles in this order, walnut, ash,alder, ash,mahogany --I think walnut wins, but not for tele tones especially, that one is a dimarzio tonezone esq, its my main gigging instrument, sounds ace. the mahogany one is basically a les paul custom in tele shape, sounds magical, the ash ones, both sound like teles, and the alder one is a copy of the keef type of nocaster--most tele-like, 
its all down to the pickups and amps at the end of the day--but I do think walnut has something going on--sustain for days.
YMMV
andy k

andy_k

hard ash v swamp ash--2 very different things, walnut is closer to hard ash, heavy and dense, so mellow, but bright, swamp ash--woody, but can be bright too

Andyjr1515

Walnut is a beautiful wood to work with and can produce an equally beautiful and wonderfully sounding guitar.