Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi,

First of all I would like to thank everyone for such interesting and resourceful forum.

I'm currently building a Steel String with a sitka spruce top, I got to a point where I'm ready to brace however I do not have any spruce available to brace with, while looking at my pile of wood I have accumulated and I found two potential candidates.

1. 50yr old Douglas Fir which came from an old piano.
2. Well seasoned red cedar from a house demolition.

Both pieces are well quartered and split beautifully. Are any of these usable? and what impact would it potentially have on tone and structural soundness of my guitar.

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Tomasz Cudzich

The Douglas fir might work out nicely. You could give that a try and save the $12 worth of sitka spruce from LMI or other forum sponsor?
Your choice.

(Just in case you missed it, that was a strong hint that you should get the sitka.)

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"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.

Hello,

I have used Doulas Fir for back braces, finger braces, and tone bars and it had worked just fine. You will, however, notice very quickly that fir is extremely splintery and loves to painfully lodge itself in your fingers so be careful.

Where you are located in Mississauga you could just get some sitka bracewood at www.amwoodinc.com or some nice lutz from Shane at High Mountain Tonewood.

The Loonie has tanked so ordering abroad will cost ya 30% more in exchange alone!

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Guitar Building = Continuous Improvement Process

Important That the QS grain is perpendicular to the top and back plate for desired stength. but you probably knw that

Thanks for the replies.

I think all is not lost since as it was suggested i could use it for back bracing.

I did however manage to find a tonewood store in burlington which is within a 15min drive, you can check them out at. http://www.exotic-woods.com I will check them out on saturday.

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Tomasz Cudzich

Tomasz,

Exotic woods in Burlington is a great store! I've bought lots of b/s sets, tops, etc. from them. In case you didn't notice, they're only open until noon on Sat. so get there early.

Exotic still has some decent pieces of red spruce cut up for bracing - it makes great bracewood. They had more a couple weeks ago, but then I showed up ...

say hi to my bud and student Joe, and Rick at the counter while you are there !!!

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

Check out the 2 X 6 lumber at Lowes and Home Depot. Some good spruce can be found there and cheep.
Here is a piece that was flat sawn but is really quartered when stood on edge. I split this piece and jointed the split edge to cut my braces from. As you can see there is no runout. I shoud be able to get quite a few good braces from that one piece.