Does wood make a difference?

[Fantom]

does the type of wood the body is made of make a difference when selecting a pickup? I have an older B.C. Rich Mockingbird that's bone stock and sounds like ****. I've been playing guitar for a lot of years but only now getting into modding them; my les paul being the first to get new pickups, I think the BCR could use some love too. I'm not sure what wood it is but from the wear it has, it's defiantely a white wood. I'm thinking Invaders will be cool since I play mainly hard rock and metal but I wonder if it'll be a waste putting them in a guitar that cost less then the pickups will.

 

[Snake Aces]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

Here we go...

IMO it does. There are many factors and body wood is one of them.

Let's try to keep this thread civil when it comes to varying opinions on the subject.

 

[DreX]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

I have an older B.C. Rich Mockingbird that's bone stock and sounds like ****...but I wonder if it'll be a waste putting them in a guitar that cost less then the pickups will.

I've definitely "saved" some Strats that didn't play nice with certain pickups by eventually finding a pickup that complimented the base tone better. At first I had blamed the pickups, but after several swaps with no improvement, I figured out it was the guitar and was happy that I kept the pickups around to be tried on other guitars later, and I did find pickups that made the guitar work. Which pickup will improve the situation depends on what you dislike about the tone. If you have pickups with a wide dynamic range, but the guitar sounds wimpy, a pickup that compresses more, or just has higher output in general, will give a greater sense of evenness and sustain. If the guitar sounds dull or dark, a pickup with a higher resonant peak will help bring out the harder-to-hear higher frequencies. In most of my situations, a brighter, punchier pickup make the guitar in question sound better. What is it you dislike about the BC Rich's tone?

Also keep in mind that you can always recover the pickups from the guitar later if you decide to ditch the B.C. Rich, so it's not exactly throwing good money after bad.

 

[Darg1911]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

I think it does too. But a lot of things must. I have several mahogany body, maple cap, set mahogany neck, rosewood board guitars. Same scale lengths. Body shapes are different. Sizes and weights are slightly different. Bridges are different. One of them is a string thru and it is by far the darkest guitar I have. The pickups that I've swapped between those guitars don't sound exactly the same in any two of them, although it's not nearly as drastic as with that string thru. So is it mainly the string-thru on that dark guitar? Are the differences between the others the fact that some are single cut and some are double cuts? More wood / weight? Maple cap thickness differences? Bridge differences?

I'm guessing that it's a combination of everything together.

 

[VHTJay]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

"Here we go" is what I was thinking when I saw this thread title. Yeah, there are two fairly entrenched, disparate factions when it comes to opinions on this, but I too hope it remains civil.

I am in the camp that believes it DOES make a difference. This comes from the experience of owning many guitars and often having the same pickups in each.

My favourite example of this is when I had two of my PRS Singlecuts loaded with S-Decos. Same construction, scale, nut, electronics, body wood amd top wood. The only difference is the neck wood and fretboard wood. One has an ebony/rosewood combo amd the other a rosewood/mahogany combo. Same pickups.....VERY different sounding guitars! The rosewood neck/ebony combination guitar has a huge low end and extended top end...the mahogany/rosewood, more midrange and punch. I had another mahogany/rosewood single cut that also sounded very similar when loaded with the S-Deco pickup. All the rosewood necked guitars I have owned or played have also displayed the tonal signature of that singlecut (to slightly varying degrees) as well.

 

[JB_From_Hell]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

I believe the density of the wood certainly makes a difference. I also believe the construction (neck joint, bridge, scale length, etc...) makes a very big difference.

 

[MacBradley]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

When mic'd up, the wood makes much less of a difference than if you can hear the guitar acoustically in the room as well. I find pickup height, bridge type, setup, ect to make more of a difference than the wood in my observations, but I also haven't done extensive testing.

 

[Fantom]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

it's a bolt on neck and has a Floyd Trem on it, also been pro set up. what I don't like about it is, I play 99% of the time using the bridge pickup and it lacks a lot of top end, sounds to me to be really flat and cold, no crunch to it at all. would best describe it as if I was using the bridge and neck pickup simultaneously and that's just not the tone I enjoy playing with. probably the main reason why I haven't played this guitar in a lot of years.

 

[Securb]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

does the type of wood the body is made of make a difference when selecting a pickup? I have an older B.C. Rich Mockingbird that's bone stock and sounds like ****.

I am guessing your guitar is a mahogany body with a white maple top. When talking about tone woods that combination is about as good as it gets. I think your problem is B. C. Rich pickups are horrible at best. I have a Mockingbird myself and replaced the stock pickups with Fralin Metal SHOs and couldn't be happier. The guitar now sounds like a beast.

 

[Snake Aces]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

it's a bolt on neck and has a Floyd Trem on it, also been pro set up. what I don't like about it is, I play 99% of the time using the bridge pickup and it lacks a lot of top end, sounds to me to be really flat and cold, no crunch to it at all. would best describe it as if I was using the bridge and neck pickup simultaneously and that's just not the tone I enjoy playing with. probably the main reason why I haven't played this guitar in a lot of years.

It sounds like something a new pickup could help fix. There are so many great pickups on the market now but since you say you are looking for top end, life and a little crunch I would narrow my search to some of the higher output pickups if I were you. I am more of a low output guy myself so I will leave it to some of the guys who play more on higher output pups to give you suggestions.

 

[blueman335]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

It definitely does. A PU will sound very different in an LP than it does in a Strat. That's been stated thousands of times here over the years. There's nothing to argue about.

 

[DreX]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

I think the structure of the guitar is more influentual in that case. I have a 'tone wood' test rig nearly completed, its been more work than I anticipated.

 

[Davii]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

As far as the tone wood debate is concerned, the only honest answer I can give is "I don't know".

I've got a BCR Mockingbird ST, which came with Rockfield pups... that I couldn't rip out fast enough. I tried a 496R in the neck (horribly muddy), and a 498T in the bridge (ok). 490R in the neck was ok, if uninspiring, and briefly tried a WLH in that position too. The WLH was nice, but I prefer the set of APH-2 Slash it has at the moment, which has rounder edges compared to the WLH. All just my opinion, of course, and I play a mix of classic/heavier style of rock.

As it's my second guitar, it tends to be the one I try things out on, including changing out the Alpha pots that mine came with (and next time, not just for different Alpha pot, grr).

 

[Gibson 1964]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

it's a bolt on neck and has a Floyd Trem on it, also been pro set up. what I don't like about it is, I play 99% of the time using the bridge pickup and it lacks a lot of top end, sounds to me to be really flat and cold, no crunch to it at all. would best describe it as if I was using the bridge and neck pickup simultaneously and that's just not the tone I enjoy playing with. probably the main reason why I haven't played this guitar in a lot of years.

As someone who has moved an entire harness over to several guitars with drastically differing results, wood matters. Wood cost, does not. An expensive plank can sound dead and cheap can sound good. I have built quite a few and I have even made a couple duds that ended up being disposed of.

If this is your description, I would avoid invaders, (they don't have a lot of top end) and go with the black winter, or distortion. Nazgul 6 might be another option, but I would highly recommend the bws to do what you want.

 

[EDX]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

tonewood, it affects, yep it does, how much, well now that's a little harder to say, but for what i heard shape also has a big impact, take chunks of maghogany and turn them into a Les Paul, a Explorer, a Flying V and a Stratocaster, none of them will sound alike, even if they use the same construction, neck wood, fingerborad wood, nut material, bridge, pickups, whaever you want is the same except the shape, they will sound different, just by 2 aspects, the amount of wood, and the distribution of that wood, thats why a LP will sound rounder than a Exporer even with the explorer having more wood, also is the reason why a flying V has more mids, tighter low end and less rounder top than both the LP and Explorer, and also why the Strat has the same amount of body but isn't as thick sounding as the V, also construction imparts some qualities, bolt-on has the most snap to the attack.

those observations are general, so while they're not law most of the times those differences will be there.

now for bring the high end up, look at the distortion and the alternative 8, either of 'em should do the work

 

[Snake Aces]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

I could post some clips of some songs but my singing is rather terrible as I have never been able to find a singer I like working with who doesn't quit, skip practice to get spun or any of the other issues I've had with them over the years. I have some clips of a Wenge with Ziricote fretboard 24.75" scale neck, an all Indian Rosewood 24.75" scale neck and my friend's all Indian rosewood 25.5" scale neck (I used to play bass for him). However, I do not think they would do much to help the discussion as I never recorded the same bodies with different necks attached through the same amps at the same time to give an A/B comparison.

It's not really my bag to be concerned with the scientific "proving" of this debate because I just play and I play a lot. Over the years I have developed an ear to hear the differences between the woods I have used as well as an understanding of how things like fret material, bridge type and scale length also affect the tone. Even if it's all in my head I'm still ok with believing there is a difference I am hearing because I enjoy playing my guitars. At the end of the day, I think that's what's important. Buy and mod guitars so you love playing them.

 

[AlexR]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

Wood is important, being the anchor point for the string tension. Some of the nature of its structure/density etc is transferred to the string through a filter effect (the short explanation).

The higher output the pickup the more of its nature shines through in the final sound. However I remember one amusing thread here where one guy thought mahogany was too 'tuneful' (too much mids push I think) for his blackouts (or whatever metal pickup he was using). He wanted a wood much more neutral in tone so the pickups would sound uncoloured by the guitar. So even with high output it seems that the wood shines through in some applications.


Certainly there is endless anecdotes of pickups playing better in one guitar rather than another of seemingly identical construction. And plenty of threads with 'you need to play a bunch of LP 'x' model and find one that speaks to you'. These seem to (if not prove) certainly give strong circumstantial evidence of something going on with the 'not hardware' side of the instrument.

 

[richardmac]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

Eureka! I have discovered the only civil "Does tonewood matter" discussion on the entire Internet. I think I have a slightly different answer than the usual responses: Sometimes the wood matters, and sometimes it doesn't. You can have two different guitars that are identical except for the body wood, and they can sound identical through an amp. You can have two different guitars with the same everything except body wood and they can sound different. In my opinion, the answer is sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. I don't know why. My guess would be that it has to do with what Paul R Smith says - the amount of water and the crystallization of the resin in the wood. He says that has more to do with sound than the actual type of wood.

Some folks in the anti-wood group attempt to use "science" to prove their point of view by quoting some laws of physics, applying them to the question, and then stating that their hypothesis is fact. It isn't. It's a guess. The unfortunate thing is that they are correct in some cases, maybe even in most cases, but not in all.

 

[JB_From_Hell]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

Some folks in the anti-wood group attempt to use "science" to prove their point of view by quoting some laws of physics, applying them to the question, and then stating that their hypothesis is fact. It isn't. It's a guess. The unfortunate thing is that they are correct in some cases, maybe even in most cases, but not in all.

They're completely missing the point. If I think mahogany sings more than basswood, it's going to affect how I play. If I feel good about holding a swamp ash Tele, but ashamed of a plywood no name cheapie, it's going to affect how I play. Regardless of what any meter or scope picks up, to a great many people, the wood will matter.

 

[DreX]

Re: Does wood make a difference?

Eureka! I have discovered the only civil "Does tonewood matter" discussion on the entire Internet.

Well first of all, we're at page 1, reserve judgement until page 25. Second... I'm a little frightened at the thought that you might have created an account just to post in this thread. The last time around, the guy actually make his username "tonewoods", and he was banned before the thread concluded.

I'm working on a tone wood experiment right now, it's about 75% done, but it's proving to be more tricky and laborious than I anticipated. My guess, in general, is that there is an audible difference, but that people will frequently understate of overstate it's significance to the end result.