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Same guitar, all mahogany

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  • Same guitar, all mahogany

    Hi folks,

    My favorte guitar is an Ibanez SZ that I loaded with Duncans. I have two actually, but sonically, they're just great. Mahogany with a maple cap.

    I saw a white one passing by on a local used gear market, looked it up on IbanezWiki, this is the SZ320EX, which is all mahogany.

    I love white guitars and it would be cool to have a white one, but I'm not sure what to expect. The two I have sound a bit different but have great resonance and clarity, as well as a full sound. But they have maple caps and the white one doesn't.

    Would it sound vastly different?

  • #2
    Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

    Nope

    I have a swamp ash Gibson LP
    A Basswood semihollow LP

    And an Ibanez RG

    All with JB/JAZZ pickups

    They sound almost identical
    EHD
    Just here surfing Guitar Pron
    RG2EX1 w/ SD hot-rodded pickups / RG4EXFM1 w/ Carvin S22j/b + FVN middle
    SR500 / Martin 000CE-1/Epiphone Hummingbird
    Epiphone Florentine with OEM Probuckers
    Ehdwuld branded Blue semi hollow custom with JB/Jazz
    Reptile Green Gibson Custom Studio / Aqua Dean Shire semi hollow with piezo
    Carvin Belair / Laney GC80A Acoustic Amp (a gift from Guitar Player Mag)
    GNX3000 (yea I'm a modeler)

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    • #3
      Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

      Body wood makes very little difference to the sound that comes out of your amp. Less than amp, speaker, pickups, strings, bridge . . .
      Join me in the fight against muscular atrophy!

      Originally posted by Douglas Adams
      This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

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      • #4
        Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

        Well,

        I once had the opportunity (I think they came from a failing store) to buy two Michael Harding Patriots, new and identical, at half the price.

        Same wood, same pickups, and they sounded very differently. You can hear it when you tap them with your knuckle, the knock (natural resonance frequency) is at least two whole tones apart, they couldn't be more apart. One was very midrange heavy, the other has a really deep, dark sound. The big difference really baffled me. But then again, no two pieces of wood are the same.

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        • #5
          Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

          So you dont need our answers at all then?
          EHD
          Just here surfing Guitar Pron
          RG2EX1 w/ SD hot-rodded pickups / RG4EXFM1 w/ Carvin S22j/b + FVN middle
          SR500 / Martin 000CE-1/Epiphone Hummingbird
          Epiphone Florentine with OEM Probuckers
          Ehdwuld branded Blue semi hollow custom with JB/Jazz
          Reptile Green Gibson Custom Studio / Aqua Dean Shire semi hollow with piezo
          Carvin Belair / Laney GC80A Acoustic Amp (a gift from Guitar Player Mag)
          GNX3000 (yea I'm a modeler)

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

            You will probably notice a difference but you might like it.
            The things that you wanted
            I bought them for you

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            • #7
              Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

              I think the cap's just a veneer tbh

              In which case there wouldn't be a difference at all

              Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk
              Originally posted by Myaccount876
              Attenuators are for pussies. Neighbors calling the cops isn't a problem - if the cops can actually still decipher the neighbor's complaint on the phone with the Marshall in the background, you're doing it wrong and it needs to be louder.

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              • #8
                Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                It will sound different, but how vast is really more about how good your ears are. 2 people can say things sound the same, while another comes along and accuses them of being deaf.
                Administrator of the SDUGF

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                • #9
                  Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                  I always can feel a softer/rounder low-end with a mahogany neck vs a maple neck. Not a big "sound" difference IMO.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                    Some people's pickups/rig/processing just kills any of the more subtle aspects of the tone. They're the ones you typically hear saying there is no difference at all. Very high volume also shuts down your ear's sensitivity, so if you only ever compare at over 100db, then your ears are in no shape to make any comparison.
                    There could also be hearing damage for the more elderly members who have gigged for years to factor in.
                    If you have tried very few guitars in forming an opinion(another really common occurence in the no difference camp), then these are quite unreliable opinions to rely on as they are based on little to no statistical significance.

                    My experience is that there are indeed subtle but noticeable differences in chassis more often than not.....based on perhaps 80-100 guitars of all construction types and very varied woods used. Be it wood type, thickness of slab, shape of body, cutaway type etc. Sometimes it can be that you get a whole different vibe from the same guitar type with the same pickups fitted. Other times it might be that certain pickups just really do or don't suit at all in certain individual instruments where they work the opposite in another seemingly identical instrument.

                    I've had all of these scenarios.
                    I've also had guitars with seemingly opposite construction sound remarkably similar.

                    Its so varied that you cannot give any prediction on actual tone likely.....only a vague guesstimate on what could happen based on a rough average.

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                    • #11
                      Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                      Originally posted by Archer250 View Post
                      I think the cap's just a veneer tbh

                      In which case there wouldn't be a difference at all

                      Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk
                      I actually went to the trouble of stripping the 320SZ I owned; it's a full maple cap, although quite a few pieces:





                      Larry

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                      • #12
                        Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                        Here’s two identical basses I built. They both have cherry bodies. One has a maple top, and the other is zebrawood. The necks are 7 piece maple-purpleheart.

                        The tops are about a 1/2” thick. The maple top bass is noticeably brighter than the zebrawood bass, even unplugged.

                        So body wood does matter, but not as much as the neck. But in general harder denser woods are brighter.

                        Whether or not you will hear that on that guitar has a lot to do with how thick the top is, and the overall weight of the guitar.
                        This is why two of the same model can sound a bit different. Wood is not uniform.
                        And if you use a lot of distortion you won’t hear what the guitar sounds like

                        Try one out and see.




                        Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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                        • #13
                          Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                          Originally posted by larryguitar View Post
                          I actually went to the trouble of stripping the 320SZ I owned; it's a full maple cap, although quite a few pieces:





                          Larry
                          Thanks, really interesting!

                          How many pieces is the mahogany back of the body?

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                          • #14
                            Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                            Body wood makes very little difference to the sound that comes out of your amp. Less than amp, speaker, pickups, strings, bridge . . .
                            I'm not going to start a tonewood argument with you, but I think it's obvious that all the gear works together to produce a certain sound. But some parts of the equation (like the wood), make a big difference because that's where the sound STARTS. If your guitar won't produce 650Hz, nothing - as in NOTHING - in the rest of your signal chain will add it back in. Wood counts, period. All you have to do is play guitars side by side UNPLUGGED to get the general idea. They do sound different.
                            aka Chris Pile, formerly of Six String Fever

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                            • #15
                              Re: Same guitar, all mahogany

                              I used to have one of those SZ320's. Great guitars for the money.

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