Fender Stratocaster made out of.....cardboard.

[DrNomis_44]

I seem to remember finding a webpage on the internet where someone had made a Stratocaster body out of sheet Aluminum.


Here it is:


http://jbwid.com/guitar/stratalum.htm

[stan]

Great read on the aluminium strat

[tonyw]

Hi Tony, solid argument there based on the cardboard guitar outcome however the level of sustain would differ based on wood density and you would have to wonder why Gibson can get so many different sounds out of the same pickup configurations across their various body shapes. For example anyone can pick a Les Paul with their eyes closed and same goes for SG yet they sound distinctly different. Likewise when compared to Explorer and Flying V where the latter has least amount of wood and therefore sounds much brighter if not brittle when compared back to the standard old LP. Most Strats have so much empty space underneath their pick guards and that may lend weight to your theory as the pickups are mostly floating and not attached to the timber. We can expand the topic to include semi hollow bodies where the amount of timber density would be reflected in the overall tone and sound. And finally, if we consider the carbon fibre Steinbergers they had a unique sound due mostly to their composite structure not just from the EMG's installed on top.

Place an unplugged electric guitar away from your body then strum it, now place the guitar against your body, its been muted by your solid mass. Your playing cranked through an amp, if anyone can hear the contribution of the timber over the electrics. well thats great but i cant

Everyone is entitled to their thoughts, i have no argument, but mine will never change. I buy tonewood for looks, i buy pickups bridges electronics, strings and my nut for sound. SG's and LP's have so many different tonal possibilities it would be impossible to compare 2 exactly against each other. Is the wiring on both Vintage or modern, no 2 pickups sound the same even if machine wound, there is always subtle variations, if they are scatter wound even more so. What were the pot values in the guitars, 500k or 300k Gibson use both, and did they have matched pairs, no they wouldnt of gone through the task of finding 2 pots and 2 caps of same value, the difference can be 100k or-. What caps are in the guitars and are their values exactly the same probably not

Now you get this lovely piece of timber, tap test it and go wow, then people go on about what finish to use, need to let the timber breathe, timber is dead it dont breathe, its just a chunk of carbon. Leo Fender used Alder and Swamp Ash why? not to make the tone of the guitar different but because he was a tight arse and went for whatever was cheaper at the time, same for the Alnico for his pickups because it was scarce.

As i said no arguments from me, just my beliefs after a life time of being around guitars, any there is too many vaiables when comparing one guitar against another.

Just on the EMG pickups, they use a stronger ceramic steel blended magnet which makes tone brighter, more cutting and more powerful, i believe that would be 90% of the unique tone right there.

Anways just my thoughts, no use rambling on about it, if you like a lump of timber and in your own mind it makes your guitars sound better then more power to you

[wazkelly]

Fair comments Tony and glad that we all have differing opinions as life would be pretty boring otherwise.

Whilst talking about strumming an unplugged electric, when holding it against your body and strumming or picking notes some sound better than others and I think that might just be the timber contributing something right there. Drop in hot PUP's and then run the signal through all sorts of gadgets and you can create all manner of sounds that may have very little of that timber talk left once it reaches the speakers.

Gotta wonder how we explain why a maple lacquered fret board sounds brighter than an unfinished rose wood one as surely that is some of the timber talking too?

[tonyw]

Waz many years ago when i was still into the tonewood theory i was witness to a blind test of 4 similar guitars, 2 tele, 2 strats, 2 different fretboards, Rosewood and Maple. When the test was over out of 10 guys, all guitarists, 4 said the rosewood sounded sharper 3 said the Maple sounded sharper and 3 said they couldnt tell the difference on the strat, on the tele 5 said no difference 3 said the maple was sharper 2 said the rosewood and even though i was a rosewood neck guy, i like the feel of them, i had to say i couldnt tell the difference, but i was looking at the guitars as the test was being done.

This test is not conclusive, you would have to carry out a test with only one variable, the fretboard, same neck weight molecular construction, moisture content etc. In the above test i witnessed the bodies and nuts differ and many variables are not accounted for including the string gauge and material, fretwire, pickups, pots, wiring, switches, bridges and saddles, tuning machines and i believe all these variables come into account well before the timbers would, and any sound change would be so insignificant from the fret board it would take a dog to hear them.

Now do i believe tonewood has a part in a guitars sound? yes! but a very very minor one, so much so the average bloke cant hear it.

The guitar industry tells us what we want to hear and in typical sales fashion people believe what they are reading and being told, i can remember the heavier the timber the more sustain thing, the lighter the body the more sustain, Mahogany has more sustain and is brighter, Swamp Ash is better than Alder, Alder is better than Swamp Ash, this is when i started to concentrate on pickups and wiring, now thats where the tone is, get that right and you can make your guitar out of chep pallets and it will still sound great.

I think as guitar players we waste too much time on things that are of little or no consequence to us, i dont chase the ultimate tone, i prefer to do some recording and playing or suck up some solder fumes playing with a wiring idea i have in my head, as for the timber? if i like the look of it? thats my 1st reaction to it, i buy it and use it and try an make a unique guitar out of it.

I grew up around instruments, my older brother is a world renowned wind instrument repairer for symphony orchestras including China, and as is a specialist violin maker. Silly me and my other older brother went the player path and did the hard yards. Later in life i got a huge interest in constructing guitars and making pickups, the way i hear them in my head, and hopefully i spit out exactly the instrument/pickup i was thinking about, i tried to cut through the BS which makes it alot easier to get to the end result. I think we worry too much about wether this is right or that is right, its only as i got older i started to care less about certain factors and put things into the perspective of am i liking what i am hearing and dont worry about all the small things.

By the way i believe tonewoods are extremely important in acoustic instruments, as are the strings causing a sound wave because of disturbance on the air, but thats a whole other department

p.s dont get me started on pickups

[wazkelly]

Reckon we could have a great chat over many beers as I am open to all points of view.

[Nickosaurus]

Funnily enough my favourite guitar for heavy tones is my first starter strat that I've hot rodded. Mystery wood body (looks like somewhere between Alder + Mahogany), massive swimming pool route, mismatched neck, random pickups I found in my parts box, put it all together and wow. Every guitar is unique and every guitar has its quirks. Who cares about all the expensive parts... My view is just build something and play the life out of it

Here she is (currently has a rosewood neck on it though)

[tonyw]

Reckon we could have a great chat over many beers as I am open to all points of view.

I had a few last night mate, nothing like talking and playing guitars and drinking haha.

Yeah i am a listener, i like to pick the brains of all the old guys who have guitars in their veins, but this information is becoming scarcer as the older guys pass on. I get guys say can i buy them a neck i want blah blah blah more tone this more tone that, i just say ok heres the price. Can i give them a pickup that has huge output 16kohms or more, i say yeh i can wind you a big k ohms pickup, i dont tell them that DC resistance or ohms to rate a pickup, is only the resistance in the wire at 0 hertz and has nothing to do with the output or the tone, but its become an excepted measure in the industry. Inductance in Henries is my preferred measure when i wind a pickup, but i always give them the Kohms measure first because thats what the industry has told them is the standard.

Keep it simple and play the instrument for what it is, thats how easy it is

[tonyw]

Funnily enough my favourite guitar for heavy tones is my first starter strat that I've hot rodded. Mystery wood body (looks like somewhere between Alder + Mahogany), massive swimming pool route, mismatched neck, random pickups I found in my parts box, put it all together and wow. Every guitar is unique and every guitar has its quirks. Who cares about all the expensive parts... My view is just build something and play the life out of it

Here she is (currently has a rosewood neck on it though)

I never used to like paisley but gee its grown on me over the years, nice looking guitar you have there.

I love to play this piece of plank very loud and very hard, its like riding a bucking bronco that squeals like a pig, but do it rock? yeh

1964 Teisco WG-4L Listening to Hound Dog Taylor got me into these things.

[keloooe]

Hi Tony, just a quick reminder to watch your language around here, it is a 100% family friendly forum, especially since we have a 10 year old who is on the forum