WOOD - How to "assemble" a good sound-board?

[J D Sauser]

I've worked with wood all my life from childhood on. Building furniture, a water wheel, model air planes...

I on the verge of ordering a pile of Paulownia wood to make a sound board for my next prototype PSG.
The sound board will be thick as to include what we perceive as the neck, similar to a Fender PSG.
So, I am not assembling a "plank" but more like the soundboard like seen on lap steel.

I understand that one would ideally glue several "sticks" of quarter-sawn wood.
My question is, HOW to you arrange their assembly... looking at how the cross section "partial radiuses" face each others?

Thanks!... J-D.

[John Hyland]

Hi JD
Is you query how to lay up strips of wood to glue them.?
An acoustic sound board has the grain vertical. I guess that is the most stable and less likely to warp. Whether that is important to your needs I don’t know. I suspect your realistic concern is more a cosmetic one.

[J D Sauser]

Hey John.

I am looking to build a sounboard much like a Fender or Gibson console... a big slab of wood.

Since I am told that one should NOT use just a "plank" of wood but instead "assemble" the slab from several "bars" of wood which should preferably each be "Quarter-Sawn":

Here's a probably "bad" or imperfect example:





What I need to know is, how to arrange the quarter sawn parts: All with the "arches" in the same direction, or opposing each other, or... ?

Thanks!... J-D.

[Andy DePaule]

Hi JD,
I'm not sure about Gibson, but Fender used Poplar wood in most of their instrument bodies.
The reason is that it's plentiful, cheap and easy to sand and put a finish on.
It's a closed grain hardwood that as wood goes is fairly soft.
It is also available in thick 2" and 4" thick wide boards and it's a very stable wood so no need to laminate. Can be found at local hardwood lumber shops.
Because of the closed grain you can apply lacquer or auto paints and they don't keep shrinking into the wood pores.

If you want a Poplar instrument to look better you can veneer it with any wood you like.
Figured Maple is really nice because it's also a closed grain.

When I worked at Zeta where we made lots of electric fiddles as well as cellos, bass's and guitars we used Bass wood for the same reasons.
One of the guys there told me that he'd also seen some Fender bodies made from Bass wood.

[Chris Clem]

Hi JD,
I'm not sure about Gibson, but Fender used Poplar wood in most of their instrument bodies.

When I was restoring guitars for the vintage shops in Hollywood I did most all the refinishes of the guitars that had been already been refinished though the years. Those shops wanted either a custom color chart color or a sunburst, (something Fender like made them easy to resell)

Of all the 200 or so guitars I refinished they were all made of either Alder or Ash. These were all guitars from the 1950s or 60s. None of them were Poplar, but the stores didn't bother with refinishing the lap steels at that time.

JD I will send you a picture of how to assemble the wood later today....it's still dark out here.

[J D Sauser]

Hi JD,
I'm not sure about Gibson, but Fender used Poplar wood in most of their instrument bodies.
The reason is that it's plentiful, cheap and easy to sand and put a finish on.
It's a closed grain hardwood that as wood goes is fairly soft.
It is also available in thick 2" and 4" thick wide boards and it's a very stable wood so no need to laminate. Can be found at local hardwood lumber shops.
Because of the closed grain you can apply lacquer or auto paints and they don't keep shrinking into the wood pores.

If you want a Poplar instrument to look better you can veneer it with any wood you like.
Figured Maple is really nice because it's also a closed grain.

When I worked at Zeta where we made lots of electric fiddles as well as cellos, bass's and guitars we used Bass wood for the same reasons.
One of the guys there told me that he'd also seen some Fender bodies made from Bass wood.

Thanks Andy.
I don't know if Fender or Gibson made their console bodies out of one integral slab of wood or did assemble them from "bars".
I will NOT make a soundboard from just one piece of wood, because it will warp, bend and move too much due to temp. and humidity fluctuations.
I will assemble my soundboard from 4 o 5 bars to about 10" wide and 2 1/2" thick. Once I got a board, the shape of the neck will be milled out like a Fender steel guitar.
I am at this stage not interested in fancy wood (burl/fiddle back or birdseye) and will instead concentrate on straight fiber woods for best tonal response and strength.

My PSG design, foresees to have the soundboard float on a frame which will hold the cross-shafts and stops (and thus assume the forces which are blamed for "body-drop" detuning, without relaying those structural changes to the soundboard which will only hold the tuning-changer on one side and the bridge on the other and the strings. Like on a Fender, I will seek to keep the strings only reasonably high above the fretboard to limit tension on the sound board.
I am debating tension-rods to run from left to right, connected or not to the string-holding hardware because of tonal concerns.
The soundboards will be lacquered, most likely in solid color and I am also debating the paint material with tone first in mind.

The goal is a PSG with all of a modern advanced PSG's capabilities to have the tonal qualities of a best quality non-pedal steel by removing the changer and it's large radius "bridge" from the sound-side, ditching the U-shaped cabinet for a good soundboard, and removing the detuning issues for pedal stop-pull down cabinet stress.
I might even go with a intonable bridge and with different materials under certain strings... like glass under heave wound strings and real bone under the thinnest strings to brighten up the bass and warm the treble end.
Individual pole pickup, which can each be slid left to right to be closer to the bridge or the neck, much like a graphic equalizer. The signal being bundled into a normal plug.
I am toying with doing away with frontal pedal rods too. I play single necks and my knees tend to be a micro-meter off the rods or half entangled into them.

But right now, I need to learn about proper wood plank "assembly" for resillience and seasonal stability.

So, I'll await Chris' imput!


Thanks!... J-D.

[J D Sauser]

Hi JD,
I'm not sure about Gibson, but Fender used Poplar wood in most of their instrument bodies.

When I was restoring guitars for the vintage shops in Hollywood I did most all the refinishes of the guitars that had been already been refinished though the years. Those shops wanted either a custom color chart color or a sunburst, (something Fender like made them easy to resell)

Of all the 200 or so guitars I refinished they were all made of either Alder or Ash. These were all guitars from the 1950s or 60s. None of them were Poplar, but the stores didn't bother with refinishing the lap steels at that time.

JD I will send you a picture of how to assemble the wood later today....it's still dark out here.

Cool Chris. I'll await your instructions! Thanks!... J-D.

[Chris Clem]

I was a journeyman cabinet maker before I started building and restoring guitars, so this is right up my alley.

When you buy quartersawn hardwoods they are usually only sort of quartersawn. Where on an acoustic guitar top they will be almost 90 degree grain (straight up & down).

I would never put narrow pieces together like your photo shows. That is more like a butcher block assembly.

A top for a steel should only have one or two (maybe three pieces at the most).

Glue them up like I show in the drawing. No dowels, no bisquits just butt them together.

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[J D Sauser]

I was a journeyman cabinet maker before I started building and restoring guitars, so this is right up my alley.

When you buy quartersawn hardwoods they are usually only sort of quartersawn. Where on an acoustic guitar top they will be almost 90 degree grain (straight up & down).

I would never put narrow pieces together like your photo shows. That is more like a butcher block assembly.

A top for a steel should only have one or two (maybe three pieces at the most).

Glue them up like I show in the drawing. No dowels, no bisquits just butt them together.

[/img]

Thanks a LOT for the lesson, Chris. I appreciate.

OK... I learned something today... 3 new Jazz-Blues lines and how to make a Butcher Block and how to make a sound board.

What glue, Chris?

Thanks!... J-D.

[Chris Clem]

Fender used Weldwood resin glue. It is a brown powder that is mixed with water. They used this for gluing guitar body's and also used it for the finger-joint cabinets. They still make it (now owned by DAP) but it seems to be hard to find nowadays.

Veneer Supplies.com sells this same glue under their name Ultra Cat PPR Veneer Glue. I just bought some and it seems exactly the same glue. They call it veneer glue because it is also used in many shops for applying veneers and used for exterior wood work. It's good stuff. They are also my go-to for exotic veneers.



https://www.veneersupplies.com/products ... -Glue.html

[J D Sauser]

Fender used Weldwood resin glue. It is a brown powder that is mixed with water. They used this for gluing guitar body's and also used it for the finger-joint cabinets. They still make it (now owned by DAP) but it seems to be hard to find nowadays.

Veneer Supplies.com sells this same glue under their name Ultra Cat PPR Veneer Glue. I just bought some and it seems exactly the same glue. They call it veneer glue because it is also used in many shops for applying veneers and used for exterior wood work. It's good stuff. They are also my go-to for exotic veneers.

Can't thank you enough, Chris.

I just watched a few youtube videos on the subject... "Hard As A Rock" is the term most use to describe it.

Thanks!... J-D.

https://www.veneersupplies.com/products ... -Glue.html

[Andy DePaule]

Chris seems to know more than me. With his experience I'd trust that.

I spent most of my life building and not repairing too much.
However I did refinish three Fender solid bodies in the 70's. Two Guitars and one Jazz Bass.
The Jazz Bass was mine and it was Poplar for sure as was one of the Guitars, a Tele. The other was indeed an Alder Strat.
At my age of 76 now I couldn't remember the name of that wood which I never used in my builds.
I'm sure those two were Poplar because they were very white except for green streaks along the side edges.
Both of those were sunburst and one was a palsy Tele. Back then nobody liked the pasty's.

My bass was a pre CBS (1964) that I'd bought in a pawn shop for $145.00 in 1969.
It was in rough shape and had a Krishna picture glued between the pickups and a peace symbol also glued in the lower upper bout. That was San Francisco!

It was a normal Fender Sunburst and the black edge hid the green streak.
In the early 70's I stripped it down. Veneered the face and back with very fine Flamed Maple.
I refinished it with the same Yellow Red Black sunburst. I hid the edges of the veneer under the black edges.
Came out great and I kept it until the late 80's when I sold it for about $800.00

[Bobby D. Jones]

Quarter sawed is a very labor tensive undertaking on a saw mill. To properly cut quarter sawed wood the log must be cut into 4 quarters, Then only about 2 inches on each straight side of the pie piece is true quarter sawed wood. The rest of the quarter on big logs is cut into square timbers or cross ties, Or ends up in pallet material.

Most Maple quarter sawed wood, Is cut special and ends up in the music instrument supply chain.

I would not suggest using Tulip Popular wood in a sound board. Tulip is a slightly punky wood when carving. I wish I had used maple or oak in this project, But I only had Tulip Poplar in 2" thickness.

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The crack in the lower right side came after it was glued together.