Official Luthiers Forum!

Hey all, I'm getting ready to fulfill a project I've thought of for some time; a guitar made entirely of timber native to my home state of New York. I've sourced all of the other components but the one that alludes me is persimmon for the fretboard and bridge. I'd prefer quarter sawn material with color, maybe even a bit of black heartwood if the tree was old and big enough, but I can't seem to find anything at all.

I’ve got some Persimmon, probably from Pennsylvania though I bought it in Maryland. It’s mostly grey with some streaks of green and tan color. The black heartwood is often cracky and crumbly, so it may not be much use to you. I can spare you a fingerboard and bridge if you can accept wood from outside of New York—it could have grown there, this piece just didn’t. Have you talked to Peter Cefalu at RC Tonewoods (in Buffalo). If he doesn’t have any, he might know a source. There used to be a guy who show up at Woodstock (he’s retired and I can’t remember his name at the moment) who was looking for alternative fingerboard woods. At one point, he had Persimmon.

I have read articles about ebonizing persimmon. If the piece is too gray.....

_________________
Wake up and smell the rosewood!

No need, as persimmon is a true ebony.

_________________
"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Persimmon is an ebony, but it's not usually black; at least not all the way through. I have used pieces with black streaking that was sound. It used to be used for the 'wood' golf club heads, so it could not have been too fragile.

The person selling black dyed persimmon at Woodstock was probably Tom Thiel. He's now out of the business. The dyed stuff was apparently tricky to do, and the unreliability of the process made it expensive. People didn't want to spend as much for a substitute as the real thing, so it didn't catch on.

I got some white persimmon at a local hardwood place many years ago, and got a batch that was grey, cut in Tennessee some time back. I've been staining it with a walnut hull 'tea' for fingerboards: it's not dark all the way through, of course, but at least it doesn't show the dirt. It's common where my daughter lives in St. Louis, but it's not really a northern tree.

Two 'local' woods here in NH that make decent fingerboards are hop hornbeam and American hornbeam. Both are local 'iron woods'. Hop hornbeam is straight grained, light tan to white, very tight and dense. It's sometimes called 'lever wood' since it makes really good tool handles. American hornbeam, called 'blue beech' or 'muscle wood' has gnarly grain with smooth bark and prominent rays that resemble beech. It's also tight grained, has the lowest tangential to radial shrinkage ratio of any wood I've seen, and it also extremely difficult to split. It's one of my favorite fingerboard woods, when I can get it. Both of the hornbeams are small understory trees that seldom reach more that 30 feet tall or 8" in diameter, and there is no established market for them. I get most of mine from the fire wood pile: the low shrinkage ratio of blue beech means it hardly end checks at all.

I’ve been using Persimmon, Black Locust, and Osage Orange for fingerboards. Of the three, the Osage seems to be most stable although stability has not been a problem with any. One of the features of light fingerboard woods is that they reveal the areas that the player frequents. It personalizes the guitar. It’s a shame the Hornbeams aren’t more available. They ought to make great bridge pins. I’ve been making tool handles out of Persimmon.

I have been collecting persimmon for fingerboards and bridges for decades. Solid black (heartwood) or variegated with black streaks is really rare in my area (East TN). The sapwood can vary from creamy to grayish.
When I have used it, I have either left it natural pale color or dyed it with black aniline. The dye holds up well on the bridge, but will eventually wear through on a fingerboard. A consolation is that it can easily be redyed in a few minutes.
On one guitar with dyed persimmon, I bound the fingerboard with black ABS to simplify the dyeing after the frets were installed.
I also like the idea of using domestic woods entirely, and have long planned to build a guitar using only woods from my neighborhood. While I don't have any persimmon cut in the immediate vicinity, I do have some other hard woods that are candidates. Those include black locust, dogwood, and some unusually dense and hard black cherry.

_________________
John

Hi Bob, thanks for your generous offer! I'm not too concerned with the material being completely dark, would just like to avoid a completely white fretboard; I have no plans to dye the fretboard or bridge as I quite like the way it looks naturally. I'm also not too concerned with where it grew only that the species is native to my area. I think as Al mentioned you're thinking of Tom Theil, he had a propriety method of dying persimmon completely black with the result looking identical to African or Indian ebony. I think he had difficulty producing black boards en masse and the few he had were quite expensive. Tom was always very friendly and had some great red spruce he cut in New England.

Please let me know how much I should send over for the fretboard and bridge (and shipping), I really appreciate the help!

Joshia de Jonge built a rather fancy guitar recently with hornbeam for the fretboard; I was quite a fan of the results. I've been using German hornbeam for binding on a few cuban mahogany Torres inspired guitars recently and love to work with it.

I seem to recall a photo you had shared of a persimmon fretboard with some prominent black streaking, it's too bad timber like that is the exception rather than the rule! I don't plan to dye the fretboard as I kind of like the idea of a unique look for this project, some European makers I know took part in a local wood challenge and I found the lighter colored Laburnum, Pear, and oak fretboards used to be quite nice

Yes, it was Tom Theil. I just couldn’t remember that last name. Rather than doing our back and forth in public, do you mind getting my email off of my website? I find the PM feature awkward. Pop me an email and we’ll go from there. I have a lot more Persimmon than I’ll use in this lifetime—I bought a tree many years ago. If I remember in the morning, I’ll go out in the daylight and try to find a colorful board.

The student who turned me on to persimmon found a fellow who had a warehouse full of it; mostly black. He'd been a golf club maker, and squirrelled away a fair amount. He was firmly convinced that the industry would wake up one morning to the folly of their ways and return to making golf club heads from persimmon rather than plastic He would not part with any of it. Once it a while he'd use a piece to make a trophy. I hope it's still out there. Someplace...

One of the best ebony substitutes I've seen was found by that same student: soft shell almond. He'd moved to California and picked up some in a fire wood pile by an almond grove. It's as hard, tight, and dense as African ebony, but it's a medium to dark brown color. The hard shell almond wood he got from the same source is ring-porous, and not as hard, so it's not as good.

I've been using persimmon for years as bridge plates: when skew cut it's extremely difficult to split. I got a 10" log of hop hornbeam from the local fire wood guy a few years back, and managed to process out one ~4' length of it with my little band saw, and help from a friend. That stuff is heavy. Now that it has had some time to season I'll start using that for bridge plates.

I have visited the Forestry Forum and found many local woods discussed. This is where people logging local woods discuss issues. I got quarter sawn sycamore here. However, the shipping was $90 for $50 of wood.
Bob

Sorry, I don't think I posted it properly.