Tonewoods: Scientifically sound or just a load of *******?
Discussion
singlecoil said:
I agree that different woods will have different effects on the sound produced, but those differences, unless there is a gross difference in the densities, will not amount to anything that can be distinguished by ear. In other words, it's a theoretical difference, not a practical one.
The OP specifically asked for a scientific discussion. To have a scientific discussion, you need agreement of the basic physics involved before discussing what that physics practically means. Some of the OPs posts imply disagreement with the basic physics. You can't have a scientific discussion based on "I'm not going to engage in scientific discussion, if you disagree with me then you're a Fanbois".Nanook said:
singlecoil said:
Anyone debating on the side of 'it is possible to hear it with the naked ear' is on to a loser.
A more useful discussion would be about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
Well, it depends on how extreme your material selection is going to be. Have you actually read this thread? Or just jumped in?A more useful discussion would be about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
singlecoil said:
I agree that different woods will have different effects on the sound produced, but those differences, unless there is a gross difference in the densities, will not amount to anything that can be distinguished by ear. In other words, it's a theoretical difference, not a practical one.
Nanook said:
singlecoil said:
Anyway, I think we all agree now, yes? Material selection obviously contributes to the tone. And we all, apart from the OP, appear to agree on why.
Nanook said:
singlecoil said:
I did delete a post but it did not relate to anything you said.
Well, it did. Because my post where I called you funny was in refernence to the frankly stupid comment you made.Feel free to drop it now though, and stop dragging us off topic.
Let's put to one side whether or not you can hear a difference and just step back for a second and think about the physics.
Consider a block of some material, makes no difference what is made of. For the sake of argument, let's say it is a rectangular block of steel. If you bend it then release it, twist it then release it, smack it one of its faces ... any of these perturbations will cause it to start a particular form of oscillation. The "smack" compression wave can bounce back and forth from front to back, top to bottom, side to side depending which face you slapped. The "twist" can be around any of the 3 axes. Similarly there are 3 planes in which the "bend" oscillation can take place.
Each of the perturbations above will lead to an oscillation whose frequency is a function of the density and springyness (stiffness) of the material, and the oscillations will die away (decay) due to internal friction converting the energy of the oscillation to heat. These three properties are key to any form of oscillation.
The perturbations I've described will tend to produce oscillations at a natural frequency, but if you smack, bend, twist the block appropriately you can induce higher frequency harmonic oscillations too. Note that for that one block the 9 different oscillations described will usually have their own separate natural frequencies ... no reason at all why they should be the same.
And finally there's another thing you can do; you can force the block to oscillate by coupling it to some other oscillating object. This coupling can be used to induce any of the 9 flavours of oscillation mentioned above and they can be at any frequency you like.
So even a simple shape of a nice simple homogeneous material can have extremely rich oscillatory behaviour.
That covers the basics, I think. You can apply those ideas to a system like an electric guitar plugged into an amp. What you've really got is an horrendously complicated set of coupled oscillators. The string is coupled to other oscillators mechanically at either end, it is coupled to the air in the room, it is coupled to the pickup via a magnetic field.
You can think of the neck and body as being separate oscillators, coupled to each other and to the strings. They are all driving each other. The shape of the body will determine how it oscillates, e.g. some glam rocky V-shaped thing will behave a bit like a tuning fork in a way that a banjo-like shape would not.
The air in the room is an oscillator. It is coupled to the speaker and the string. That creates a resonant feedback loop, hence why you can change the harmonics that are being driven by the feedback by varying how close the strings are to the speaker; you're altering the natural frequency of the air between the string and speaker.
The shape, density, stiffness and frictional properties of every component of the system will have some impact on how the system behaves as a whole. And obviously that must include the materials used to construct the body of the guitar. Different bits of wood will have different densities, stiffness and internal friction (that latter two also differing markedly across and along the grain as well as wibbling around across any given piece of wood as its far from a perfect homogenous material even after you've taken grain into account.)
But is the type of wood a significant determinant of what you can actually hear?
I don't know for sure, but I would be very, very surprised. The overwhelming determinants are the modes of oscillation of the strings, the behaviour of thr pickups, distortion intentionally built into the amp and the acoustic coupling between the speaker and the strings. Next,and way behind, would be the shape and bulk properties of the neck and body.
If anyone were claiming that the only way to get a particular quality of sound out of an electric guitar was to use a particular kind of wood, they'd be talking out of their hoop.
Consider a block of some material, makes no difference what is made of. For the sake of argument, let's say it is a rectangular block of steel. If you bend it then release it, twist it then release it, smack it one of its faces ... any of these perturbations will cause it to start a particular form of oscillation. The "smack" compression wave can bounce back and forth from front to back, top to bottom, side to side depending which face you slapped. The "twist" can be around any of the 3 axes. Similarly there are 3 planes in which the "bend" oscillation can take place.
Each of the perturbations above will lead to an oscillation whose frequency is a function of the density and springyness (stiffness) of the material, and the oscillations will die away (decay) due to internal friction converting the energy of the oscillation to heat. These three properties are key to any form of oscillation.
The perturbations I've described will tend to produce oscillations at a natural frequency, but if you smack, bend, twist the block appropriately you can induce higher frequency harmonic oscillations too. Note that for that one block the 9 different oscillations described will usually have their own separate natural frequencies ... no reason at all why they should be the same.
And finally there's another thing you can do; you can force the block to oscillate by coupling it to some other oscillating object. This coupling can be used to induce any of the 9 flavours of oscillation mentioned above and they can be at any frequency you like.
So even a simple shape of a nice simple homogeneous material can have extremely rich oscillatory behaviour.
That covers the basics, I think. You can apply those ideas to a system like an electric guitar plugged into an amp. What you've really got is an horrendously complicated set of coupled oscillators. The string is coupled to other oscillators mechanically at either end, it is coupled to the air in the room, it is coupled to the pickup via a magnetic field.
You can think of the neck and body as being separate oscillators, coupled to each other and to the strings. They are all driving each other. The shape of the body will determine how it oscillates, e.g. some glam rocky V-shaped thing will behave a bit like a tuning fork in a way that a banjo-like shape would not.
The air in the room is an oscillator. It is coupled to the speaker and the string. That creates a resonant feedback loop, hence why you can change the harmonics that are being driven by the feedback by varying how close the strings are to the speaker; you're altering the natural frequency of the air between the string and speaker.
The shape, density, stiffness and frictional properties of every component of the system will have some impact on how the system behaves as a whole. And obviously that must include the materials used to construct the body of the guitar. Different bits of wood will have different densities, stiffness and internal friction (that latter two also differing markedly across and along the grain as well as wibbling around across any given piece of wood as its far from a perfect homogenous material even after you've taken grain into account.)
But is the type of wood a significant determinant of what you can actually hear?
I don't know for sure, but I would be very, very surprised. The overwhelming determinants are the modes of oscillation of the strings, the behaviour of thr pickups, distortion intentionally built into the amp and the acoustic coupling between the speaker and the strings. Next,and way behind, would be the shape and bulk properties of the neck and body.
If anyone were claiming that the only way to get a particular quality of sound out of an electric guitar was to use a particular kind of wood, they'd be talking out of their hoop.
ATG said:
Let's put to one side whether or not you can hear a difference and just step back for a second and think about the physics.
Consider a block of some material, makes no difference what is made of. For the sake of argument, let's say it is a rectangular block of steel. If you bend it then release it, twist it then release it, smack it one of its faces ... any of these perturbations will cause it to start a particular form of oscillation. The "smack" compression wave can bounce back and forth from front to back, top to bottom, side to side depending which face you slapped. The "twist" can be around any of the 3 axes. Similarly there are 3 planes in which the "bend" oscillation can take place.
Each of the perturbations above will lead to an oscillation whose frequency is a function of the density and springyness (stiffness) of the material, and the oscillations will die away (decay) due to internal friction converting the energy of the oscillation to heat. These three properties are key to any form of oscillation.
The perturbations I've described will tend to produce oscillations at a natural frequency, but if you smack, bend, twist the block appropriately you can induce higher frequency harmonic oscillations too. Note that for that one block the 9 different oscillations described will usually have their own separate natural frequencies ... no reason at all why they should be the same.
And finally there's another thing you can do; you can force the block to oscillate by coupling it to some other oscillating object. This coupling can be used to induce any of the 9 flavours of oscillation mentioned above and they can be at any frequency you like.
So even a simple shape of a nice simple homogeneous material can have extremely rich oscillatory behaviour.
That covers the basics, I think. You can apply those ideas to a system like an electric guitar plugged into an amp. What you've really got is an horrendously complicated set of coupled oscillators. The string is coupled to other oscillators mechanically at either end, it is coupled to the air in the room, it is coupled to the pickup via a magnetic field.
You can think of the neck and body as being separate oscillators, coupled to each other and to the strings. They are all driving each other. The shape of the body will determine how it oscillates, e.g. some glam rocky V-shaped thing will behave a bit like a tuning fork in a way that a banjo-like shape would not.
The air in the room is an oscillator. It is coupled to the speaker and the string. That creates a resonant feedback loop, hence why you can change the harmonics that are being driven by the feedback by varying how close the strings are to the speaker; you're altering the natural frequency of the air between the string and speaker.
The shape, density, stiffness and frictional properties of every component of the system will have some impact on how the system behaves as a whole. And obviously that must include the materials used to construct the body of the guitar. Different bits of wood will have different densities, stiffness and internal friction (that latter two also differing markedly across and along the grain as well as wibbling around across any given piece of wood as its far from a perfect homogenous material even after you've taken grain into account.)
But is the type of wood a significant determinant of what you can actually hear?
I don't know for sure, but I would be very, very surprised. The overwhelming determinants are the modes of oscillation of the strings, the behaviour of thr pickups, distortion intentionally built into the amp and the acoustic coupling between the speaker and the strings. Next,and way behind, would be the shape and bulk properties of the neck and body.
If anyone were claiming that the only way to get a particular quality of sound out of an electric guitar was to use a particular kind of wood, they'd be talking out of their hoop.
Well, that's better than "Tonewoods are bConsider a block of some material, makes no difference what is made of. For the sake of argument, let's say it is a rectangular block of steel. If you bend it then release it, twist it then release it, smack it one of its faces ... any of these perturbations will cause it to start a particular form of oscillation. The "smack" compression wave can bounce back and forth from front to back, top to bottom, side to side depending which face you slapped. The "twist" can be around any of the 3 axes. Similarly there are 3 planes in which the "bend" oscillation can take place.
Each of the perturbations above will lead to an oscillation whose frequency is a function of the density and springyness (stiffness) of the material, and the oscillations will die away (decay) due to internal friction converting the energy of the oscillation to heat. These three properties are key to any form of oscillation.
The perturbations I've described will tend to produce oscillations at a natural frequency, but if you smack, bend, twist the block appropriately you can induce higher frequency harmonic oscillations too. Note that for that one block the 9 different oscillations described will usually have their own separate natural frequencies ... no reason at all why they should be the same.
And finally there's another thing you can do; you can force the block to oscillate by coupling it to some other oscillating object. This coupling can be used to induce any of the 9 flavours of oscillation mentioned above and they can be at any frequency you like.
So even a simple shape of a nice simple homogeneous material can have extremely rich oscillatory behaviour.
That covers the basics, I think. You can apply those ideas to a system like an electric guitar plugged into an amp. What you've really got is an horrendously complicated set of coupled oscillators. The string is coupled to other oscillators mechanically at either end, it is coupled to the air in the room, it is coupled to the pickup via a magnetic field.
You can think of the neck and body as being separate oscillators, coupled to each other and to the strings. They are all driving each other. The shape of the body will determine how it oscillates, e.g. some glam rocky V-shaped thing will behave a bit like a tuning fork in a way that a banjo-like shape would not.
The air in the room is an oscillator. It is coupled to the speaker and the string. That creates a resonant feedback loop, hence why you can change the harmonics that are being driven by the feedback by varying how close the strings are to the speaker; you're altering the natural frequency of the air between the string and speaker.
The shape, density, stiffness and frictional properties of every component of the system will have some impact on how the system behaves as a whole. And obviously that must include the materials used to construct the body of the guitar. Different bits of wood will have different densities, stiffness and internal friction (that latter two also differing markedly across and along the grain as well as wibbling around across any given piece of wood as its far from a perfect homogenous material even after you've taken grain into account.)
But is the type of wood a significant determinant of what you can actually hear?
I don't know for sure, but I would be very, very surprised. The overwhelming determinants are the modes of oscillation of the strings, the behaviour of thr pickups, distortion intentionally built into the amp and the acoustic coupling between the speaker and the strings. Next,and way behind, would be the shape and bulk properties of the neck and body.
If anyone were claiming that the only way to get a particular quality of sound out of an electric guitar was to use a particular kind of wood, they'd be talking out of their hoop.
ks....'.Gassing Station | Music | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff