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Sobre o acoplamento corda-corpo em guitarras elétricas e sua relação com o timbre do instrumento. Physicæ 9, 2010, pp. 24 - 29
'String-body coupling on electric guitars and its relation with the timbre of the instrument.'
Rodrigo Mateus Pereira(1), Albary Laibida Junior, Thiago Corrêa de Freitas.
(1) Tecnologia em Luteria, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Brazil.
Abstract.
Nine electric guitar bodies were built in the form of the Telecaster model by the author RMP. These were assembled using the same neck and pickup assembly. Once each body was assembled two strings of the electric guitar were mechanically excited and the sound, obtained directly from the instrument, was recorded for later analysis. Also recorded was a musical piece played with each electric guitar. These sounds were analysed via a Fourier transform in order to obtain the component harmonics of the sound, these harmonics are responsible for the timbre of the instrument. The harmonic spectra of each electric guitar were compared to each other and there were no significant differences between them. Thus the variations of timbre of electric guitars, according to the results obtained here, depend on other factors than the wood of the body itself, a fact that arises from the absence of a significant coupling between the string and the body of the instrument. Also proposed is a modelling of the string-body coupling, which shows that only a negligible amount of energy from the vibrating string reaches the body of the instrument and that a smaller amount still returns up the string.
http://physicae.ifi.unicamp.br/index.php/physicae/article/view/physicae.9.5/116
I have also found some forum comments by the primary author where he discusses his methods and research in detail. I haven't yet found any respondents telling him to flush his research "down the toilet where bullshit belongs". Perhaps disappointingly, non of his research seems to have involved 'tapping and sniffing' any bits of wood.
Seems that there is solid academic research into this topic out there, just not in English.
Conclusion? The effects of 'tone wood' are all in the mind and are not supported by the laws of physics. Yes, different guitars may 'feel' different in the hands, may even sound different acoustically and the raw wood might smell differently if you sniff it. However, due to the fact that the string-body coupling is weak, this will not be translated into a different amplified sound, as heard by a properly made, non-microphonic electromagnetic pickup. The rest is just cork sniffing.(Or should that be wood sniffing!)
Unless anyone has any credible evidence to the contrary, of course.
I must get my hearing tested, I hadn't realised I was so cloth-eared.
Either that or I must get one of those machines to do my listening for me.
Its one of the greatest and worst things about working with wood...
EVERY piece is slightly different... So every guitar is slightly different. They all sound like electric guitars within a certain frequency range (which is determined by the pickups) but the exact frequency response will depend on the density of the wood which varies throughout a single piece. Anyone who has worked with wood will tell you that.. As you cut through it you get harder areas.
The most convincing test for this I ever saw (I will see if I can find it again) was a guy who took a pickup and attached it to a block of wood and had a direct output to an amp.. Then he placed a small music box at the opposite end of the wood (one of those old time ones where you have to turn the handle and it revolves a barrel around which pings some metal strips) and as he turned the handle you could hear the vibrations being picked up through the wood.
So if this is the case that the pickups DO pickup vibration from the wood (and I do think they do) as well as the strings the it makes perfect sense that if each piece of wood is different each one will react slightly differently...
Im not calling this scientific proof before anyone jumps down my throat..
http://www.rabswoodguitars.co.uk/
https://www.facebook.com/RabsWoodGuitars/
My Youtube page
Debunked by Rodrigo Mateus Pereira, Albary Laibida Junior, Thiago Corrêa de Freitas in ''String-body coupling on electric guitars and its relation with the timbre of the instrument.' Physicæ 9, 2010, pp. 24 - 29
Well their debunking is just as dodgy as any of the so called tests to prove it.. He may seem like hes talking sense but that doesn't make it so.
This is the issue. Theres no real proof either way... So i say think what ever makes you happy.. If knowing you have a classic combination of tried and tested "tonewoods" makes you happy then cool.. If you think they are all the same and it doesnt matter then cool...
I also think that if people maybe paid more attention to how they play than what they play we would all be a lot happier (and im not being patronising saying im a great player or anything cos im really not)..
http://www.rabswoodguitars.co.uk/
https://www.facebook.com/RabsWoodGuitars/
My Youtube page
Disappearing into the theory rabbit hole for a moment...
I think that Paul Reed Smith makes a very good point in that an ideal instrument has the least amount of 'subtraction' from the original energy in the strings.
But it's also more complicated than that.
Resonance requires no more energy in (and therefore does not rob your strings of energy). Its simply that all of the energy is going on the right direction to increase the amplitude of the oscillation at that particular frequency. Think of when you sing in the shower. Some notes are louder than others yet you don't have to sing any louder to produce them. Or when you push a kid on a swing. If the input frequency is right then you get resonance and a bigger amplitude for the same energy in. The same is true with your strings and guitar.
But with an electric guitar it is complicated by the fact that you have three (or more?) major components in the system i.e. Strings, guitar and amp/speaker. So you can have resonance between all of them. That's quite a complicated system.
For any frequency that resonates you'll also get some harmonics that resonate with it. When you find a resonant frequency singing in the shower you'll also get a bit of resonance if you sing an octave higher or lower.
So perhaps guitars that resonate more at the RIGHT frequencies also actually sound better?
The wood probably plays a role here. The material that the guitar is made from probably matters to the extent that it provides a good basis for these resonant frequencies. This is what I think you can hear in the clip, especially maple vs mahogany.
I suspect there is a lot to learn in this which can either be learned by trial and error or by the application of physics. Art AND science. McCarty, Fender, Reed Smith, Jackson etc have probably all learned this one way or another.
Of course this could all be wrong, but just my two pence....
The graphs look like they're measuring harmonic content in a time averaged way, to look at overall differences in timbre between the bodies. It doesn't look like they've examined time-related behaviour, unless that's buried in the text somewhere. Since one of the more common claims about body wood choice is that it affects the envelope of the note, this would be a fruitful area for further work. They're looking at bolt-on neck tele bodies, and it seems not inconceivable that different neck/body geometry, types of neck joint and bridge might behave differently in terms of string to body coupling. It also seems likely that the neck may have some effect, which is not examined here.
So, it's interesting reading, I appreciate it being posted here, but what I don't take from it is "That's it for tonewood then".
Well said.
• Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@Goldeneraguitars
As to resonance. For resonance to selectively preserve or enhance certain harmonic frequencies in a way that consistently affects the timbre of the sound, it would have to resonate in a way that affects all frequencies / notes in the same way. However, the body and neck of an electric guitar resonate at specific frequencies, which might not even correspond to any single tuned note, let alone the whole chromatic scale.
Where resonance does show an effect, this is usually in the way it creates undesirable 'wolf tones' (if one keeps adding energy to the system, as with a bowed instrument) or 'dead spots'. Here is a paper on this topic.
https://www.unibw.de/lrt4/mechanik/mitarbeiter/ehem-mitarbeiter/hfleischer/deadspots-en
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Helmut_Fleischer/publication/282789912_Fleischer_H_und_Zwicker_T_Investigating_dead_spots_of_electric_guitars_Acustica_united_with_acta_acustica_85_1999_128_-135/links/561c9f8208ae6d17308b2365/Fleischer-H-und-Zwicker-T-Investigating-dead-spots-of-electric-guitars-Acustica-united-with-acta-acustica-85-1999-128-135.pdf
C-, must think more clearly.
Still, doubtless the 'wood sniffers' will continue to allow their preconceptions about the way things 'should' sound to dominate what they 'hear', perhaps reinforced by subtle, unconscious changes in the way they play to get the sound they expect, and will maintain that they can hear a difference, just as some people will continue to maintain that they can hear the difference between a $50 speaker cable and one costing $7250.
Unless anyone can point to research showing otherwise, of course.
I could take a treasured 1962 strat ("amazing responsive instrument, fabulous tone, just sings" etc.) and replace the body with anything of the same dimensions (a cheap copy off ebay? plywood?) and the guitar would sound just the same. Also, as a side note: issues about thick poly finishes vanish, since this is just part of a guitar body that can have no influence anyhow.
And then I think, what about the neck/fingerboard? Does this matter? - since the string attaches to the wooden body at one end, and the wooden neck at the other, either via fret or nut. Body and neck - both solid bits of wood - are perhaps analogous/similar in respect of influence on tone, or lack of it. I can't see why they wouldn't be anyhow. So maybe I could swap the '62 strat's neck for any other of the same dimensions, and still do nothing to degrade the tone.
At which point we're basicaly left with the guitar's hardware, and the pickups - hardware can easily be upgraded these days, and there are fine pickup makers around, able to replicate vintage pickup specs, or produce designs of their own. So this implies to me that someone with a sensibly upgraded Squier strat, or other copy, is no worse off than the owner of the '62 strat... I suppose quite a liberating thought for the more cash-strapped among us.
And also, that pickup makers are hugely important people - even more so than we might already believe, and the cost of quality pickups is utterly justified, as this is one of the few things on the guitar itself, that can influence the tone.
As it happens, I'm a fan of upgrading pickups anyhow, and to be clear, I'm not convinced at all that body (or neck) wood has no discernible influence - but I would genuinely be interested to know how far you agree with the reasoning above TCS.
https://www.escavador.com/sobre/8006405/rodrigo-mateus-pereira
https://www.escavador.com/sobre/5917495/thiago-correa-de-freitas
http://www.luteria.ufpr.br/portal/
Perhaps Homer should have the last word?
I'd hate to go guitar shopping with you @Three-ColourSunburst
It must be a very grim and joyless experience.
As well as a long drawn out one if you insist on taking all your scientific measuring equipment with you.
I'll be testing the frequency response of every guitar I try from now on. As if I haven't got enough to carry into a guitar shop already, with my scales and calipers to measure the depth of the neck....
Formerly TheGuitarWeasel ... Oil City Pickups ... Oil City Blog 7 String.org profile and message
So it's just a theory, but maybe the guitars that most folks think are great just happen to be made out of wood at the right size, shape and density to provide a little bit of resonance through the body at those frequencies (eg 330hz, 440hz) and the harmonics of them.
It would be pretty easy to test this in a lab, with the right equipment. It's essentially just a frequency response curve for the guitar body.