Hi All, I have often and long wondered why we do not use walnut for lutes as a body wood. It certainly is as hard as maple, particularly the birdseye, and has a beautiful nominally dark hue. I imagine a walnut body with holly spacers under a fairly clear varnish as being lovely. There are so many variations of walnut in color and figure so as to provide a pallet of choices from which the client and builder might choose. If time allowed I'd make one on spec for proof of concept. Perhaps before LSA next year.
Best, Rob Dorsey http://RobDorsey.com -----Original Message----- From: Anthony Hind [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 8:23 AM To: Martin Shepherd; Lute Net Subject: [LUTE] ebony etc Martin As you know I am not a specialist, but found a few sites where guitar makers are raising the same questions as you are. They appear to be looking at cherry, walnut, and redwood. I am not sure what woods they are hoping to replace with these. However, I heard that some lute makers might be using rifle stock wood to replace ebony. I think it is a form of walnut : Highly Figured Claro Walnut ~ Gun Stock Wood http://www.ca-walnutdesigns.com/products/products.htm Here are a few quotes about walnut, followed by remarks on persimmon ( a local American ebony-type) : Best Anthony http://crab.rutgers.edu/~pbutler/rebec.html The fingerboard, tail, endpeg, and bridge all are carved from black walnut wood to contrast with the body - cheaper for the model than the ebony I would have otherwise used, and definitely easier to find. The body was stained with a wood oil, both for color and sealing the wood, but no varnish was applied. However, there is a problem with walnut according to the following : http://groups.google.com/group/rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic/ browse_thread/thread/dee77fd44d6142a/562990314731bb57?lnk=st&q=stained +woods+to+replace+ebony&rnum=2&hl=fr#562990314731bb57 Well, recently I spoke to a (relatively new) luthier who worked for a large high-end guitar company. (I won't mention names or locations here, so as to avoid any flaming anyone.)He said that this company had a large run of Oregon walnut guitars in a number of sizes, and that they had mostly all been "duds". He felt that walnut was an excellent sound absorber (kind of like teak), rather than a sound reflecter, and provided the example of rifle stocks, where walnut is the most common wood, ostensibly because of its ability to absorb vibration. For this reason, he does not offer walnut as a choice in his guitars. Reply I have a guitar that is made completely of Walnut. Walnut back and sides, walnut top, walnut neck, and even walnut tuning knobs. Believe me, it is not a dud. The walnut top is clear, distinct, cannot be overdriven, highs and lows are very seperate, each with great fundementals. The overtones are certainly not as dominant as one would find on redwood or englemen, but they are there. The hard one to replace will be ebony. The 'local' variety, persimmon, is most usually white, although you can find logs with some dark grey streaking. Look at Henry's myrtle/spruce classical in the 'Student Gallery' on my web site to see a nice piece of persimmon used as a fingerboard. The white stuff is nice and hard, we just have to figure out how to stain it. Have you tried Black saddle dye in coats? I am not a luthier but I bought a bum-around guitar-a Martin DM and stained the Indian rosewood fingerboard and bridge with this dye and it looks like ebony from a few feet away-of course, white wood may not take the dye. Alan Carruth / Luthier http://www.alcarruthluthier.com http://groups.google.com/group/alt.guitar/browse_thread/thread/ 39d81be8892a6b79/3444368f9a812342?lnk=st&q=stained+woods+to+replace +ebony&rnum=5&hl=fr#3444368f9a812342 You can use ebanol from http://www.stewmac.com it makes rosewood look like ebony. it probably wasn't a mahogany fingerboard, most likely rosewood, or one of the cheaper woods typically used. ebanol will stay on, stain wont stay on. Patrick K <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message http://www.bartruff.com/services.php Currently good stocks of ebony come from India which has a non- threatened status for its species of Diospyros. But obviously, if every instrument maker rushes out to buy the Indian stock, there will be a problem. So, I use a little trick. Ordinary US grown persimmon certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) as sustainably grown can be stained to look as black as Indian ebony, and it is equally as fine and hard. Same Family, same Genus, different species. It even sinks in water like "ebony" because it is ebony. It makes no difference to the sound, performance or integrity of the violin and the beauty is just as lustrous. http://groups.google.com/group/rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic/ browse_thread/thread/dee77fd44d6142a/562990314731bb57?lnk=st&q=stained +woods+to+replace+ebony&rnum=2&hl=fr#562990314731bb57 The hard one to replace will be ebony. The 'local' variety, persimmon, is most usually white, although you can find logs with some dark grey streaking. Look at Henry's myrtle/spruce classical in the 'Student Gallery' on my web site to see a nice piece of persimmon used as a fingerboard. The white stuff is nice and hard, we just have to figure out how to stain it. http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0306-1078(197504)3%3A2%3C134%3AWUFWIS %3E2.0.CO%3B2-1 Rosewood, ebony and African 136 blackwood have been used but the instruments made from these woods were uncomfortably heavy and the tone derived from these ... http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0072-0127(198003)33%3C106%3AAOBJBR% 3E2.0.CO%3B2-Q http://www.alembic.com/info/wood_fingerboards.html -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
