Body wood affects tone

impmann

YouTube clips only prove one thing - that the sound on YouTube is shocking. The compression and conversion used destroys any nuances in sound. Plus if you've ever spent time in a post production suite, you'll know that you can roll any turd in glitter.

These guitars that sound like Teles but are made of odd materials - ok cool, but 1) not scientific as the player is deliberately trying to make them sound as such and 2) the pickups and hardware are from Teles, so will help get you partway there. Any subtly is lost in the recording and production on YT. And what does a Tele sound like exactly? It's a great mimic - Johnny Marr made his sound like a Rickie (actually it was Stephen Street's guitar), Page made his sound like a Les Paul, Beck made his sound like an Ude... 

I'm trying to understand why 3TS is banging on about all this. Is he trying to save the guitar world from spending too much on guitars? Is he trying to piss everyone off? Or is he just trying to be a smug know-it-all? 

As everyone has said, an electric guitar sounds like an electric guitar but there are subtle differences between models, there are subtle differences between individual instruments and some of those subtleties can be grouped (by and large) by species of wood. However it's not an exact science because wood is a naturally occurring substance.

These bullshit 'studies' that try to prove that a vibrating string strapped to a piece of wood (that *Does* sympathetically resonate in tune with that string) is not affected by the material it is strapped to have to be discounted. Firstly, common sense - if you vibrate a string and then introduce a different vibration to it, that vibration pitch and amplitude changes. Secondly, guitarists will tell you that feedback is a key piece of how a note decays and going back to point one, this is a feedback loop. Thirdly, electric guitars have been built and sold since the 1940s - are you genuinely suggesting that all of these buyers were 'wrong' in their opinions formed by playing them and that all those guitar builders were trying to hoodwink buyers? 

This is is a moribund argument that is going around in circles - you are welcome to your own opinion but please allow others to have their own. 

professorben

impmann said:

YouTube clips only prove one thing - that the sound on YouTube is shocking. The compression and conversion used destroys any nuances in sound. Plus if you've ever spent time in a post production suite, you'll know that you can roll any turd in glitter.

These guitars that sound like Teles but are made of odd materials - ok cool, but 1) not scientific as the player is deliberately trying to make them sound as such and 2) the pickups and hardware are from Teles, so will help get you partway there. Any subtly is lost in the recording and production on YT. And what does a Tele sound like exactly? It's a great mimic - Johnny Marr made his sound like a Rickie (actually it was Stephen Street's guitar), Page made his sound like a Les Paul, Beck made his sound like an Ude... 

I'm trying to understand why 3TS is banging on about all this. Is he trying to save the guitar world from spending too much on guitars? Is he trying to piss everyone off? Or is he just trying to be a smug know-it-all? 

As everyone has said, an electric guitar sounds like an electric guitar but there are subtle differences between models, there are subtle differences between individual instruments and some of those subtleties can be grouped (by and large) by species of wood. However it's not an exact science because wood is a naturally occurring substance.

These bullshit 'studies' that try to prove that a vibrating string strapped to a piece of wood (that *Does* sympathetically resonate in tune with that string) is not affected by the material it is strapped to have to be discounted. Firstly, common sense - if you vibrate a string and then introduce a different vibration to it, that vibration pitch and amplitude changes. Secondly, guitarists will tell you that feedback is a key piece of how a note decays and going back to point one, this is a feedback loop. Thirdly, electric guitars have been built and sold since the 1940s - are you genuinely suggesting that all of these buyers were 'wrong' in their opinions formed by playing them and that all those guitar builders were trying to hoodwink buyers? 

This is is a moribund argument that is going around in circles - you are welcome to your own opinion but please allow others to have their own. 

I feel like the moderate between two opposing camps here, very unusual territory for me!!!

I think everyone is both right and wrong, of course the body material affects tone, no one raves about how 'toneful' steinberger cricket bats sound. 

But when Eddie VH played one, he sounded like Eddie, my theory is the player, the amp, pedals etc have a far far greater impact on the tone than wood species, but that wood does have an impact. 

Lets be honest here if Nicoli Amati had access to carbon fibre technology back in Italy in the 16th century he may well have used it. 

In the 40's and 50's wood was cheap, high quality, and of course acoustic guitars were made of it. 

Its us guitarists that hold back any progressive development, the guitar makers make guitars out of wood, simply because they always have, and we buy them, we as a community, dont accept alternative materials as readily as say Bassists or other musicians, I can't recall a drummer getting wound up because his snare skin isn't velum, or a pianist complaining about no Ivory on his piano. 

Wood sells, we buy, it's as simple as that. 

why? Because Hendrix had a wooden guitar etc etc. 

NelsonP

Three-ColourSunburst said:

Structural vibrations induced by acoustic feedback can magnify the signal generated by the sensors embedded in the guitar to "pick up" its sound, which leads to instability. Equalization can control feedback by reducing the gain at the frequency at which this problem occurs.

Usually such feedback in an electric guitar is caused by parts of the pickup being able to move in relation to one another, such as the poles, loose windings and so on. As the body vibrates these can move relative to one another, causing feedback and squealing. It is the components of the pickup moving relative to one another that causes such feedback, not the strings, so what the strings are attached to is irrelevant! A pickup that does this is faulty and wax potting, better control of the winding tension and so on are employed to prevent this happening. Such feedback does not lead to great tone, far from it.

I think you are referring to microphonic feedback here. Guitars that aren't microphonic will still create feedback.

Feedback can also be caused mechanically - i.e. energy from the speaker finding its way back into the string and causing the strong to resonate. This can happen via the body, which is why semis and acoustics are so much more prone to feedback.

Does the solid body of an electric guitar have a role in capturing this energy?
We have already demonstrated that energy passes from the strings to the guitar body. It is reasonable to assume that the reverse is true. So assuming that the energy from the speaker is sufficient to cause vibrations in the body then these must also be passed back to the strings. Sure the overall effect is much lower than it would be for e.g. an acoustic guitar, but the basic mechanism is still there.

Does a body made from a different material capture the speaker energy in a different way?
It is likely that it will depending on the density and structure of the material that the guitar is made from will affect the response to the energy from the speaker. This could easily have an impact on the 'tone' you hear.

Whilst the example of feedback is an extreme one, I am using it to make a point. The same effect may also be happening at lower levels that are not sufficient to cause what us guitarists would recognise as feedback, but that would still modulate the tone in a way that might conceivably be heard.

One other point- if parts of the pickup are able to move in relation to one another, and the strings cause the body to vibrate, then is it possible that this vibration might also cause a coloration to the tone?

Having said that, what I'm starting to realise (and goodness it has taken some time) is that I don't know all the answers to this!
And that the internet probably isn't going to provide it either.

Sassafras

professorben said:

Its us guitarists that hold back any progressive development, the guitar makers make guitars out of wood, simply because they always have, and we buy them, we as a community, dont accept alternative materials as readily as say Bassists or other musicians, I can't recall a drummer getting wound up because his snare skin isn't velum, or a pianist complaining about no Ivory on his piano. 

Wood sells, we buy, it's as simple as that. 

why? Because Hendrix had a wooden guitar etc etc. 

Interesting point about snare skins. I play banjo and there is a distinct difference between vellum and synthetic skins.
I'd refer you to extensive research carried out by the George Formby Institute of Banjology but I can't find the link.

Strat54

Three-ColourSunburst said:

Nice woody tone from this steel bodied guitar.

Woody? That there is proof that you have no concept of the term. 

Rox

So if I've worked this out right - given the vociferousness of the Youtube postings, Gibson / Fender (etc) are Nasa, Tonewoods are the Moon and Guitarists are Astronots?

OilCityPickups

Gassage said:

Now then....

I have just made some very simple unscientific experiments.

1. I placed two strats back to back, one amplified. I played the one not plugged in but as it was in full contact with the plugged guitar. You could hear it through the pups of the other into the amp (faintly)
2. I plucked a note on a guitar that was plugged in. As the note sustained, I grabbed and held the headstock of guitar firmly. It dampened the sound.

Discuss.

It's what I said earlier, all pickups are to a degree microphonic ... it works with a tuning fork placed on the guitar body too.  

Three-ColourSunburst

impmann said:

...These bullshit 'studies' that try to prove that a vibrating string strapped to a piece of wood (that *Does* sympathetically resonate in tune with that string) is not affected by the material it is strapped to have to be discounted. Firstly, common sense - if you vibrate a string and then introduce a different vibration to it, that vibration pitch and amplitude changes. Secondly, guitarists will tell you that feedback is a key piece of how a note decays and going back to point one, this is a feedback loop. Thirdly, electric guitars have been built and sold since the 1940s - are you genuinely suggesting that all of these buyers were 'wrong' in their opinions formed by playing them and that all those guitar builders were trying to hoodwink buyers?

 
A guitar body does not, for the most part, 'sympathetically resonate' with the string.  A guitar body can resonate if it is energised at its natural frequency (or frequencies) as a result of something else that is near by or is touching vibrating at those same frequencies. However, in a guitar body these frequencies are unlikely to be related to any tuned notes. For almost all tuned notes a guitar body, rather than resonating, will be in a state of forced vibration - which is something very different. Also - as those papers I linked to point out - when resonance does occur in guitars it is associated with the creation of 'dead spots', not a generalised modification of the timbre of the instrument.

Yes, wooden instruments can be created where vibration at their natural frequency is a central part of how they sound, such as a xylophone, but crucially a xylophone requires a separate, specially tuned piece of wood for every note. Conversely, a guitar has one body. Also, the natural frequency something vibrates at is as much a function of its size, density and even shape as what it is made from. Hence, each key of a xylophone made from the same wood will have a different mass / size. However, different materials could also be used, such as composites, or the shape changed to produce the required pitch. For example, see the article below on a 'zoolophone'.

https://phys.org/news/2015-10-algorithm-d-vibrational.html

One consequence of the above is that, if the natural frequency or 'resonance' of the body of an electric guitar was really so important to its tone (as heard via an electromagnetic pickup) not only would the type of wood used have an effect, this effect would be vastly greater if different materials were used, and all those clips of metal-bodied guitars and so on show that this is simply not the case. Also, the natural frequency of the guitar would change if the mass of the body was varied or even its shape was changed. However, even with odd-shaped guitars, such as the Explorer, we don't hear people say 'Wow, listen to that, that's a real zig-zag tone', instead they will still witter on about it being made from korina or whatever.

In short, it is nonsense to say that the 'resonance' of a guitar's body has anything to do with the sound heard via an electromagnetic pickup.

The weakness of the idea that the body somehow feeds back energy to the strings, modifying its harmonic content has already been covered: given the very small amount of energy the string gives to the body, the high impedance of the bridge to body interface, the fact that the energy given by the string is dissipated over the entire body of the guitar and so on, it is clear that the amount of energy that is returned to the string by the body is totally insignificant. The research also shows that any such feedback does not affect the harmonics sounding on the string, certainly to a degree that is perceptible.

Yes, feedback due to the air been forced to vibrate by a loud amp is  a central part of the rock guitar sound, but this has nothing to do with the sort of 'feedback' the believers in 'tone wood' argue for. Feedback due to microphonic pickups is also possible, but this just causes horrendous squealing, not a magical colouration of the timbre of the instrument.

As to why guitar makers have always preferred wood as the main material. There are a large number of obvious answers, from tradition through to cost, availability, ease of working, known technology, appearance, the conservative nature of the guitar buying public and so on.

NelsonP

Three-ColourSunburst said:

it is clear that the amount of energy that is returned to the string by the body is totally insignificant.

@Cirrus - did you get a chance to try out the double neck experiment that @crunchman proposed?

Cirrus

NelsonP said:

Three-ColourSunburst said:

it is clear that the amount of energy that is returned to the string by the body is totally insignificant.

@Cirrus - did you get a chance to try out the double neck experiment that @crunchman proposed?

No, band practice was rearranged so I didn't go to our studio on Tues like I thought I was going to. Will be going tonight, though. I'll report back!

crunchman

I think @Three-ColourSunburst does have a point about the use of the word resonant.  I think the something like "responsive" would be better for what a lot of people on guitar forums use the word resonant for.  When people talk about a guitar with a "resonant" body they aren't talking about the resonant frequency, they are talking about something that feels and sounds responsive, for want of a better word. 

While he is right on that, he is still completely wrong his assertion that there is a neglible effect on string vibration because of the body.

What @Gassage has done shows that strings do vibrate with an audible signal when excited by body wood.

The Bernie Marsden video spectacularly showed the sound from the 12 string pickups on the double neck when he played the 6 string neck.  By far the most likely mechanism for that is vibrations transmitted through the body.  If someone has one of those double necks, that could easily be proved by doing the same thing with the 6 string pickups turned down.

MartinB

crunchman said:

I think @Three-ColourSunburst does have a point about the use of the word resonant.  I think the something like "responsive" would be better for what a lot of people on guitar forums use the word resonant for.  When people talk about a guitar with a "resonant" body they aren't talking about the resonant frequency, they are talking about something that feels and sounds responsive, for want of a better word. 

While he is right on that, he is still completely wrong his assertion that there is a neglible effect on string vibration because of the body.

What @Gassage has done shows that strings do vibrate with an audible signal when excited by body wood.

The Bernie Marsden video spectacularly showed the sound from the 12 string pickups on the double neck when he played the 6 string neck.  By far the most likely mechanism for that is vibrations transmitted through the body.  If someone has one of those double necks, that could easily be proved by doing the same thing with the 6 string pickups turned down.

Yes, what I read from the available information is that the body can and does have some effect on the vibration of the string and consequently on the sound produced, but under the the conditions examined in the studies (and many playing and listening situations) the effect may be too small for this to be significant.  There simply is not enough information in any of the studies to say that this could never be of a large enough extent to be significant under all instrument designs, playing methods or measurement/listening conditions though. 
Mr Sunburst wants an absolute yes/no answer, and is more than happy to cherrypick and misinterpret data to provide him with the answer he decided he wanted from the beginning.  That's neither scientific nor objective, it's an ego-driven pissing contest.  I have availed myself of the ignore function, as there is nothing to be gained from "debate" with someone like that. 

Gassage

Rabs said:

Well while we are at it. This is one of the more interesting alternative guitars ive seen.

That guy seems quite potty.

Sassafras

bacchanalian

I am at a loss.
It seems to me that @Three-ColourSunburst will not be happy until anyone here who has posted in favour of wood being essential to tone, confesses that they now feel stupid for having been duped by Fender, Gibson, Collings, PRS.

 

Three-ColourSunburst

crunchman said:

What @Gassage has done shows that strings do vibrate with an audible signal when excited by body wood. The Bernie Marsden video spectacularly showed the sound from the 12 string pickups on the double neck when he played the 6 string neck.  By far the most likely mechanism for that is vibrations transmitted through the body.  If someone has one of those double necks, that could easily be proved by doing the same thing with the 6 string pickups turned down.

Yeah! The fact that he is sitting inches away from his amp, with the sound in the room making the strings sympathetically vibrate (with the pickups also been wired to turn both the 6 and 12-string  the pickups on at the same time) couldn't possibly have anything to do with it!

crunchman

Three-ColourSunburst said:

crunchman said:

What @Gassage has done shows that strings do vibrate with an audible signal when excited by body wood. The Bernie Marsden video spectacularly showed the sound from the 12 string pickups on the double neck when he played the 6 string neck.  By far the most likely mechanism for that is vibrations transmitted through the body.  If someone has one of those double necks, that could easily be proved by doing the same thing with the 6 string pickups turned down.

Yeah! The fact that he is sitting inches away from his amp, with the sound in the room making the strings sympathetically vibrate (with the pickups also been wired to turn both the 6 and 12-string  the pickups on at the same time) couldn't possibly have anything to do with it!

@Cirrus will be able to tell us that tonight.  If he does the same thing with the 6 string pickups down, and gets a similar result, then we know that the vibrations are transmitted through the wood.  I suspect that you will still find some way of disagreeing with anything that doesn't fit your predefined view though.

Three-ColourSunburst

crunchman said:

he is still completely wrong his assertion that there is a neglible effect on string vibration because of the body.

So how, exactly, does that work then?

For one the string must have a higher energy level than the body, which is why the body is forced to vibrate, this energy then been dissipated via the production of acoustic sound, heat and so on. For the body to somehow pass energy the other way seems to run against the principle of entropy.  (Just  a thought, this is something I need to do more reading on.)

Three-ColourSunburst

crunchman said:

@Cirrus will be able to tell us that tonight.  If he does the same thing with the 6 string pickups down, and gets a similar result, then we know that the vibrations are transmitted through the wood.  I suspect that you will still find some way of disagreeing with anything that doesn't fit your predefined view though.

I suspect the sound of the 12 strings won't be heard if only the 6-string pickup is turned on, and visa-versa.

I also think that Marsden's guitar has been modified to turn the 6 and 12-string pickups together, with perhaps one of the pots acting as a mixer, and that this is what Marsden alludes to when Anderton says that he can't understand why he is hearing the 12 strings and Marsden says something about 'giving away his secrets'.

impmann

Three-ColourSunburst said:

impmann said:

...These bullshit 'studies' that try to prove that a vibrating string strapped to a piece of wood (that *Does* sympathetically resonate in tune with that string) is not affected by the material it is strapped to have to be discounted. Firstly, common sense - if you vibrate a string and then introduce a different vibration to it, that vibration pitch and amplitude changes. Secondly, guitarists will tell you that feedback is a key piece of how a note decays and going back to point one, this is a feedback loop. Thirdly, electric guitars have been built and sold since the 1940s - are you genuinely suggesting that all of these buyers were 'wrong' in their opinions formed by playing them and that all those guitar builders were trying to hoodwink buyers?

 
A guitar body does not, for the most part, 'sympathetically resonate' with the string.  A guitar body can resonate if it is energised at its natural frequency (or frequencies) as a result of something else that is near by or is touching vibrating at those same frequencies. However, in a guitar body these frequencies are unlikely to be related to any tuned notes. For almost all tuned notes a guitar body, rather than resonating, will be in a state of forced vibration - which is something very different. Also - as those papers I linked to point out - when resonance does occur in guitars it is associated with the creation of 'dead spots', not a generalised modification of the timbre of the instrument.

Yes, wooden instruments can be created where vibration at their natural frequency is a central part of how they sound, such as a xylophone, but crucially a xylophone requires a separate, specially tuned piece of wood for every note. Conversely, a guitar has one body. Also, the natural frequency something vibrates at is as much a function of its size, density and even shape as what it is made from. Hence, each key of a xylophone made from the same wood will have a different mass / size. However, different materials could also be used, such as composites, or the shape changed to produce the required pitch. For example, see the article below on a 'zoolophone'.

https://phys.org/news/2015-10-algorithm-d-vibrational.html

One consequence of the above is that, if the natural frequency or 'resonance' of the body of an electric guitar was really so important to its tone (as heard via an electromagnetic pickup) not only would the type of wood used have an effect, this effect would be vastly greater if different materials were used, and all those clips of metal-bodied guitars and so on show that this is simply not the case. Also, the natural frequency of the guitar would change if the mass of the body was varied or even its shape was changed. However, even with odd-shaped guitars, such as the Explorer, we don't hear people say 'Wow, listen to that, that's a real zig-zag tone', instead they will still witter on about it being made from korina or whatever.

In short, it is nonsense to say that the 'resonance' of a guitar's body has anything to do with the sound heard via an electromagnetic pickup.

The weakness of the idea that the body somehow feeds back energy to the strings, modifying its harmonic content has already been covered: given the very small amount of energy the string gives to the body, the high impedance of the bridge to body interface, the fact that the energy given by the string is dissipated over the entire body of the guitar and so on, it is clear that the amount of energy that is returned to the string by the body is totally insignificant. The research also shows that any such feedback does not affect the harmonics sounding on the string, certainly to a degree that is perceptible.

Yes, feedback due to the air been forced to vibrate by a loud amp is  a central part of the rock guitar sound, but this has nothing to do with the sort of 'feedback' the believers in 'tone wood' argue for. Feedback due to microphonic pickups is also possible, but this just causes horrendous squealing, not a magical colouration of the timbre of the instrument.

As to why guitar makers have always preferred wood as the main material. There are a large number of obvious answers, from tradition through to cost, availability, ease of working, known technology, appearance, the conservative nature of the guitar buying public and so on.

Yes so in other words.... we're all wrong, all the guitar makers are wrong, the experts in the field of luthiery are wrong and you're right. Our ears are wrong, yours are right. You have "science" to back up your arguments.

Had enough of this bollocks.

Ignore status activated.