Official Luthiers Forum!

I recently got a DVD presentation made by Richard Hoover through
Artisian Guitars. He goes into stump wood a bit and explains that these
stumps are about chest height due to the way the guys needed to use
saws in the days before chain saws. If there are thousands of stumps, it
seems like there will be a decent supply of wood. I've noticed recently
that prices have come down, or at least appear to have from what
memory serves.

I have a few videos of luthiers tapping brazillian then tapping east indian.
The tap has a noticeable difference. The brazillian is brighter. It seems
that with the reflective function of the back, any wood with a similar ping
or density should be indiscernably close.

I've never handled it or purchased it, and I certainly can't distinguish what
makes the expensive grades so different from the sets you can find under
$500, so bear this in mind when reading my response.

Illegal wood is a problem here in BC too. We have "poachers" dropping big leaf maple in parks a protected forests and private property looking for quilt, flame and burl patterns. They cut open the tree after it is down. If it is figured they process and make off with it. If not it is left to rot. Kind of like Grizzly bear hunters getting claws and leaving the rest of the carcass.

_________________
Greg
http://garibaldiinstruments.com/

There are good reasons for the preference for BRW. Logically, if you think about the job that the back does, a fairly dense and reasonably stiff wood with low damping 'should' work really well. That's BRW. There are other woods that have similar mechanical and acoustic properties, and some of them, such as Balck Locust and Osage Orange, grow in the US. None of them, though, has quite the look of BRW, and as for the smell..... Sigh.

IMO, although at least some of the hype for BRW is justified, it's much more so on Classical than steel string guitars. The low damping, in particular, tends to help in the productionof high frequencies. That's not usually a problam on steel strings, but it is with nylon, simply because of the nature of the string.

I have heard of more than one instance where people have had brash fractures bending 'stump' wood. Trees accumulate compression stress as a normal thing in growing, and naturally there is more of this in the stump. The compression levels can actually build to the point that the cell walls near the center of the tree collapse. The resulting damage is virtually invisible (unlike, say, 'wind shake') but the wood is still broken. I often wonder if this is not part of the bad rep BRW has for bending: the old growth stuff I've used bends like budduh.

I've got a small and dwindling stash of old growth BRW, that I got in the '70s, and I'm not buying any more. I'm also trying to learn as much as I can about how to work with the substitutes. It's only a matter of time before all the 'usual suspects' are gone, or, at least, priced out of the running. I just hope that actions such as those taken in that story will preserve the resource so that it can be built back up for future generations to enjoy, even if only in a limited way.

Wow, discussions of back and side wood that actually acknowledge that for some guitars at least, BRW really is "da bomb."   I'm personally tired of all the posts, mostly elsewhere, claiming that a good luthier can make a great guitar out of anything.

And has anyone actually heard the de Torres papier mache guitar? And if it was so, so good, then why did he only make one?

The devil and god are in the details, and backs and sides are a big detail in acoustic guitar building.

A bad luthier can make a mess of any good wood!
I have some politicly incorect sawdust and firewood!

_________________
Greg
http://garibaldiinstruments.com/

[QUOTE=David Collins] It's about time this happened. The article I read
mentioned thirteen tons, but
over the course of the past four or five years which really isn't that much
either.

What caught my interest was this line.

"As part of this cooperative investigation, Service special agents
executed
a federal search warrant (Thursday) at a location in central
Massachusetts,"
the office said. The search warrant has been sealed by a court, and
further
information was not available, the office said.

Any speculation who or where this could be?[/QUOTE]

There is a large Brazilian population in Massachuesetts

Chris Martin was interviewed in the recent GAL issue. Martin buys their BRW from a dealer in Spain- two years ago they sent over buyers who selected 400 sets, but the deal was frozen by the Spanish government as there was some question as to the legitimacy of the wood.
Apparently they are still waiting for it.

_________________
It's not the miles ahead, it's the stone in your shoe


In Markham,Virginia

".. and as far as the Massachussets connection.. isn't this where he was from?"

Yes Brock, I have info from a luthier friend (not an OLF member) that this is so.

If this group was truly cutting mature living trees, they deserve what they get. I agree with Rick about the importation of stump wood or existing stock as being a different matter altogether.

For years we have been seeing wood sold as from "house beams", ....not likely as this wood has been valued and prized since the 17th century. More likely the "house beam" lie was designed to asuage the consciences of all the folks who bought the stuff. 

 

 

BRW is a very nice wood in most all respects, that is obvious. The thing that kills me about most sets I see, is that they often have holes, cracks, shake, wanky grain orientation and so forth that would have made them rejects when this wood was available. I often wonder if the things that make this wood so desirable are not really present in most of these sets that require repair, or structurally are anything but close to desirable. All that said these sets are going for $200+ per. bd. ft.(poor quality sets that is). Demand generated by a blind belief all things BRW are the best choice just does not add up to me. Honest good quality wood(from a pre-ban aged stash, or possibly reclaimed stump, if the wood is clean), I can see the attraction, but the rest I just don't get.

There is a dealer near me that has what I call a sucker pile of BRW. This wood is the scrappy rejects from an old stash. The wood has holes, cracks, shake, knots, you name it, and is priced from $200-$600 bd. ft. I have seen the pile slowely sell over the years, and I would point out this is cut for sets and some smallish offcut blocks(everything extreamly flawed, in terms of usability, to use this wood you would need plenty of CA, duct tape and bondo so to speak). You can't tell me this wood would make a guitar superior in any sense, yet the blind demand is strong enough to sell it (that blows my mind). Oh, and on a side note, this pile sets next to a pile of pretty fair African Blackwood at a fraction the price.

Interesting stuff,
Rich

[QUOTE=Rick Turner]
And has anyone actually heard the de Torres papier mache guitar? And if it was so, so good, then why did he only make one?
[/QUOTE]

Yes Rick, its real and it actually sounds very good. Its in the collection of the Museu de la Musica in Barcelona and Stefano Grondona has recorded with it in the companion CD to his book "Masterpieces of Guitar Making".

The thing is made out of cardboard - would you make more than one? It has had to undergo a lot of repair to keep its existence, since the material has basically no strength. He had to make a living and you can't really sell guitars made of cardboard, regardless of how they sound.

_________________
Instagram: @jfrenchluthier
Web: https://www.jfrenchguitars.com/

I can guarantee you from direct experience that some of this was was NOT old growth...and the character of on specific eBay vendor was very...ummm...slimy...to say the least...BRW does indeed have a very unique tap tone and some of that true stump wood has some figure that is just plainly astounding...true old growth salvaged woods would tend to be very stable, whereas 'new growth' will tend to be very unstable as said poachers aren't taking the time to cure it properly...

If the feds get creative and decide to trace this person's customers and go after them, watch out. They can impound whatever material is deemed questionable without recourse, and make life very unpleasant.

_________________
It's not the miles ahead, it's the stone in your shoe


In Markham,Virginia

I guess that the Feds could obtain the records for the suspect sellers' transactions from ebay and go after the buyers.  I doubt that they want to apply that much resource to the case, but, it is certainly possible.

Paul

For some who may have questions....

I've personally seen some of the wood the Rodrigo was selling, and what I saw was old growth. Very dry, very stable wood, and a lot of it was very beautiful. I can't say I've seen more than a couple dozen sets owned by one of his customers, but what I did see was great stuff, and not newer growth wood.

He didn't sell on eBay. He didn't need to or want to from what I've heard.

_________________
"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

in this case, the items had to pass through customs...if you read the articles floating around (simple google searches give results for versions from U.S. papers) you will notice the fact that some Federal employees are among those caught as part of this ring...it seems as if they were allowing these items to get through...the point being I'm sure there is ample documentation of where these items went, at least the more recent ones...obviously said U.S. participants were being watched and their activities being documented...shipments were probably seized for evidence recently and an individual should feel very lucky if he/she was able to receive a refund for an article that never arrived at their doorstep...as to who the authorities will go after of course depends upon their mindset...logic would dictate that like drug users, the end user if small time is of little consequence, while a heavy user (read manufacturer) is of more notice...in my eyes it is highly probable that some purchasers (who felt they had been cheated because of sub-standard materials) were the individuals who started this sting operation...I use the word sting because like most investigations it appears as if this operation was allowed to proceed for a time so that most of its participants could be caught in the act as it were....

[QUOTE=DP LaPlante]

"

For years we have been seeing wood sold as from "house
beams", ....not likely as this wood has been valued and prized since the
17th century. More likely the "house beam" lie was designed to asuage
the consciences of all the folks who bought the stuff. 

 

 

[/QUOTE]

I have a set that was from a door jamb. It has the hinge holes and nail
holes still in it.

The bust in Spain is still not resolved and is still going through the courts.  One very reputable dealer in Spain had a legitimate lot of BRW with the needed documentation but until the case is settled all BRW is suspect so their warehouse was sealed pending the outcome of the case.

At that point they could concievably be allowed to sell their supply but that could take years.

Robbie, My dad once had a meeting with the president of the bank of Mexico in Mexico city and he said that his entire office was paneled in Brazilian rosewood, so yes, it was often used for architectural woodwork..........

I've just seen and heard that house beam story too many times to believe it................. 

best

I know of at least a couple homes in this are, one north of Boston, one in Newport RI that have woodwork/paneling of Brazilian RW, and we're not talking veneer. It was very common several decades ago to use it in high end homes here. A friend was talking with a guy from Brazil who was doing work on his house recently. Apparently, the guy saw a small amount of BRW in his shop, and said "Jacaranda!". They got talking, and his house in Brazil is paneled with it, and the beams are BRW also. It used to be as plentiful there as oak is here...

_________________
"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

So, Rodrigo is off to the Big House.

And I still don't have any BRW

Hesh...and apologies to others here for going back to Hesh's remark about a 6'5" Saudi dude...

Have you ever tried Google Earth? With it, I can easily identify my car parked in the parking lot of my shop building here. Google Earth photos are commercial-level satellite and high over-flight images. I suspect that at the NASA/CIA/NSA level, they could read the author of the paper back novel that I left on the dashboard of that car.    And they can't find Osama with a horde of supporters being supplied by troops of tribesmen and donkeys on established pathways in Afganistan?   Gimme a break on that one.   Osama will be taken out when it's a political expediency, and not a minute before. Look for a "breakthrough" around presidential election time... That's the only way a certain party is going to win the 2008 shoot-out, no matter how odd the opposition.

I say it's Clinton/Obama vs....anybody/anybody.

End of politics...

What is a true shame is that Rodrigo himself makes beautiful guitars. The problems that he has created for himself are a result of himself and others trying to create more beautiful guitars but doing it the wrong way. It just goes to show that with guitar building, as with everything else in life, there is a right way and a wrong way to do things...and sometimes the end does not justify the means.

As for that guy in Afghanistan, I also wouldn't be surprised if he popped up around election time! Funny how that happens. It is similarly funny how two families have held the presidency for the last 20 years. We may as well give them crowns and scepters and make it official...

_________________
http://www.PeakeGuitars.com