Driftwood as tonewood?

Greyum

Greyum

New member
Take a step back and join me in the crazy thinking for the moment...

Would driftwood make a good guitar body assuming you have enough of it?
(I have a stockpile as it washes up on our shore each year, need to think up a use before it becomes firewood... or rots away)

Neck would be purchased (maple), I don’t have the tools/time/skill to do that.

Might be an interesting art project but any chance of playable results?
 
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Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

**** yeah why not just make sure its dry and obviously hasn't got rot. Watch out for nails when using a planner or thicknesser.

Chris rea's strat was in a basement underwater and he claims it made it come to life. :werd:
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

^ Plenty of stories of guitars being in floods and being ok afterwards. So its certainly possible. But those woods were dry/stable before the dunking. This wood has a possibility of being green when it went in.

Plus you have all the salts drawn into the wood.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

AlexR said:
^ Plenty of stories of guitars being in floods and being ok afterwards. So its certainly possible. But those woods were dry/stable before the dunking. This wood has a possibility of being green when it went in.

Plus you have all the salts drawn into the wood.
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If i was going to attempt something like this i would first thickness sand all the potential pieces, sticker them for half a year and then evaluate the situation.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

Most driftwood becomes fairly brittle as it drys & it's pretty prone to splintering/cracking during this process. So I'd imagine even if you were able to find several solid pieces to glue together you'd have a heck of a time trying to work it afterwards.

As to what it would sound like as a tone wood it's hard to say. I mean by the time you found enough dry un-cracked stock to build a body blank with you could have 3-5 different kinds of wood, all of which have spent various amounts of time in the water & all having their own tonal qualities???
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

Could make some cool stuff with it, but I personally wouldn't even bother with it for guitar,,,,,,,,unless we're talking stands here like that other thread. lol
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

dave74 said:
Could make some cool stuff with it, but I personally wouldn't even bother with it for guitar,,,,,,,,unless we're talking stands here like that other thread. lol
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A driftwood guitar stand or some driftwood wall hangers would be pretty cool!!!

I live in a old logging town where they used to float thousands of trees down the river from as far away as Quebec every day to make pulp & there's tons of them that got lodged in mud or stuck on the bottom. These trees will sometimes wash up during the spring thaw or people will go dig them out because a lot of them were virgin timber that are now full of beautiful mineral stains. At that point they're basically just really old & really large pieces of driftwood but they can be worked into some very interesting things!!!
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

Nostalgic Distortion said:
A driftwood guitar stand or some driftwood wall hangers would be pretty cool!!!

I live in a old logging town where they used to float thousands of trees down the river from as far away as Quebec every day to make pulp & there's tons of them that got lodged in mud or stuck on the bottom. These trees will sometimes wash up during the spring thaw or people will go dig them out because a lot of them were virgin timber that are now full of beautiful mineral stains. At that point they're basically just really old & really large pieces of driftwood but they can be worked into some very interesting things!!!
Click to expand...

That sounds a little like the Eagle bog oak range. Beautiful guitars.

https://worldguitars.co.uk/shop/patrick-james-eggle-macon-bog-oak-17908/

As for driftwood, I suspect the same as others have said - too dry, denuded and salted. Fully prepared to be proven wrong though!


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Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

I would think great swamp ash is ash that has been underwater (in a growing tree) but has small channels from bacteria/etc going through it. This will make it lighter, air-ier, and more resonant. As far as driftwood- well, you should try to work some of the wood into something else first to see how it works. It might easily splinter apart, or it might work really well.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

How about petrified wood?

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Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

Not to mention your back.

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Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

I'll just point out that making a guitar out of "sinker" logs are a little different than laminating a bunch of driftwood together.

05.jpg



Still... there's only one way to find out if your particular driftwood will work or not, and that's to experiment with it.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

yoo'd have better luck with Balsa sandwiched between legitimate tonewoods. Gibson did this on thier 80' Superstarts with great results.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

I knew someone would eventually mention sinker tonewood. There are tons of sinker woods across America in river and lakes (especially the East Coast and Great Lakes), much of it lost over 100 years ago. In fact, there are a couple wood marketers who specialize in securing, raising, milling, and curing sinker woods for high end furniture and instrument makers. Personally - I would love to have some sinker chestnut to make a couple electrics. It's beautiful, and hopefully would yield some great sounding instruments.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

ICTGoober said:
I knew someone would eventually mention sinker tonewood. There are tons of sinker woods across America in river and lakes (especially the East Coast and Great Lakes), much of it lost over 100 years ago. In fact, there are a couple wood marketers who specialize in securing, raising, milling, and curing sinker woods for high end furniture and instrument makers. Personally - I would love to have some sinker chestnut to make a couple electrics. It's beautiful, and hopefully would yield some great sounding instruments.
Click to expand...

It’s Lake Ontario driftwood. Not sure the age or wood type.
 
Re: Driftwood as tonewood?

ICTGoober said:
I knew someone would eventually mention sinker tonewood. There are tons of sinker woods across America in river and lakes (especially the East Coast and Great Lakes), much of it lost over 100 years ago. In fact, there are a couple wood marketers who specialize in securing, raising, milling, and curing sinker woods for high end furniture and instrument makers. Personally - I would love to have some sinker chestnut to make a couple electrics. It's beautiful, and hopefully would yield some great sounding instruments.
Click to expand...

If Jimmy and James Smith from Axe Men didn't get all of it. haha
 
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