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I think that the best guitar I made to date was EIRW and Sitka. It really can be a fantastic combination.

I was just giving some assessments to a lady whose luthier father had passed away, and there were a few sets of really old dark dark dark EIRW in with his wood. Gorgeous stuff! They will probably be selling it on eBay. They also had 40-50 neck blanks roughed out that they will be selling too. And no, I didn't try to buy the woods. I have too much already.

Nothing bends as easily as EIRW too, unless it's Nicaraguan Cocobolo, which bends like butter.

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"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."

Wow, Brian....insanely beautiful!
As a new builder, I appreciate that there are less expensive tonewoods to learn with, but which still have good tone. I bought a rather visually boring set of EIR from Dennis K a while back, but it taps like a bell. Since I don't have to make eye candy (yet), I'm using less costly and more readily available woods for now. For that reason, I do love EIR.

Can I modify this to "Hauser loved it, Fleta loved it, Romanillos (Jose' and Liam) loves it, Martin loves it, David LaPlante loves it, so who am I not to?!" Your up there in that class David.

I too love EIR, it is my standard wood for my classicals, right up to the top of my range. I do have a good supply of old growth straight dark grain wood, certainly enough to see me out. Some of mine is from Victorian furniture that is very unpopular in the sale rooms so can often be bought up quite cheaply.

EIR is one of those woods, like Honduran mahogany, that because it is at the cheaper end of the tonewood spectrum is underrated in this world where image is everything. If EIR (or Hon Mahogany) were the price of BRW everyone would be rushing to buy it at the totally ludicrous prices that BRW goes for now.

EIR is a premium tonewood.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Agreed. Apart from the more usual purplish/brown with black streaks i also have very stripey sets and an almost uniform chocolate brown one.

David: always a treat to see your guitars. am i wrong in thinking that maple is becoming ever more popular in the classical world?

all the best,
Miguel.

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member of the guild of professional dilettantes

Apples and oranges. Honduras mahogany is a real McCoy. Many great historical steel strings were made with it. And if you are after that sound, why would you use anything else if the real deal is still readily available and cheap?

EIR on the other hand, although a fine tone wood, is just a replacement for BRW. So, if we're all just using replacement rosewoods (with many claiming to "sound like Brazilian"), I think most of us aren't too excited about using the one wood that's on 99 percent of all rosewood guitars.

Agreed, it's under appreciated because it's so common. And I also agree that there are snooze fest (haha) examples of everything.

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Pat

I personally don't believe this statement to be true. Certainly Hauser, Fleta, Romanillos, etc... had/have access to BRW, yet they choose to use Indian Rosewood.

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Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Well, obviously I was making a generalization. Instead of saying,"just a replacement", I should have said "mainly a replacement".

Which Hauser? Which Romanillos? What years? Pre ban? Post ban? What percentage did they use EIR?

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Pat

From my experience EIR has been used as a premium tonewood in Europe for at least 250 years. I have worked on lutes dating from the early 18th century that have EIR incorporated in the shell. It is not just a BRW substitute here, but a valid alternative in its own right. Southern Europe tended to use BRW due to the Spanish connection a with South America, whereas the countries of Northern Europe had closer connections to the subcontinent.

When I manage to buy BRW furniture at auctions it gets cut up for fingerboards and bridges etc, its the EIR that gets used as back and sides.

And yes, when I went to Siguena, Jose loved my EIR.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

So just how good is this BRW stuff?? I have never seen it so as far as I know it might as well be unobtainium. Can you tell a BRW guitar and a EIR guitar apart in a blind test if all else are equal?

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

What I mean is, I don't even know what the stuff looks like and why it should cost 100 times more than a piece of EIR of similar grain/density? Also how will a customer know that it's even genuine BRW? Could have been Amazon rosewood for all I know.

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

Well, I was trying to stay out of antiquity. With England on bass, Portugal on tenor, and Italy and France joining right in, logistics and politics played a decisive role I'm sure.

All things being equal, BRW just has it all + the smell. Tai, you should get yourself some frerboards or bridges from a reputable dealer just to check it out.

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Pat

One of the main appeals of BRW to me the smell. I've only held one once and I've wanted one since; consequently I've been ripped off (bought stuff that was incorrectly labeled), purchased low quality sets for 300 that wouldn't be worth 50 bucks if it weren't for the low supply, and now- given up until I have the money to acquire a nice set from a reputable buyer (not the guy selling $1500 sets that he probably found on Ebay for 300 apiece).

Outside of the smell and the legendary status there isn't much appeal. The supply sucks, the price is ridiculous, it cracks easily and the quality of 90% of the supply is stumpwood. For my money I'd take a set of African Blackwood if I actually had money to spend.

I like EIR, but there are so many other choices out there to choose from to build a custom guitar that helps set it apart from the factory models on the shelves in music stores. I really like Cocobolo, Cultrata (that was sold to me as BRW) and most any ebony on the planet.

Thanks Colin for the very kind words.
I think one's perspective on this is dependant on what your orientation is.
Indeed (if your orientation is the steel string flat top guitar) E.I. rosewood was the replacement for Brazilian rosewood that Martin started using in 1969. One of my pet peeves with the steel string world is that these days anything other than Brazilian and red spruce is considered a 2nd class wood choice. (with just a couple of exceptions perhaps).
In the classical guitar world, E.I. has been used interchangeably (and in some case mixed) with Brazilian and many of the historically considered "best" makers have used it. There is much less concern overall with back and side wood species per se among classical players (though the guitar better have the goods whatever it's made from). The decision between a cedar or a spruce topped guitar is considered much more important.
Commercially Brazilian is just a losing proposition for all the reasons stated above (and more) and that just makes me love the very stable, reasonably priced, consistantly quartered, dark straight grained East Indian variety all the more.

I would love to get some BRW at least as a sample so I even know what the stuff is, unfortunately CITES make that impossible. Nobody I know sells even EIR fingerboard/bridge blanks in Taiwan so it's unreasonable to expect BRW. I've had to order all tonewood from overseas because the stuff I've found in Taiwan are not really of good enough quality.

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

You can't get BRW in Taiwan? I'm not surprised.

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http://www.CostaGuitars.com
PMoMC

What wood you like depends on what you like visually and sonically. I dont like the sound of EIR but think it is the best looking guitar wood, especially if the grain is straight. I have played 100's of them and they all sound the same to me. Now Cocobolo, thats different in a good way sonically but visually not so much. Like I said, my opinion.