Paulownia wood for guitars

Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Some folks from the Squier-talk forum have ordered Pawlonia bodies from Guitarfetish and they say that although it's very light, it's also very soft and prone to bruising easily. Tone is subjective to the pickups you install.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

I'm building a Tele out of Paulownia. MisterE is right. It dings and scratches if you look at it too hard and it is insanely lightweight.

Supposedly it is a great sounding wood, but I haven;t completed the build yet so I don;t have first hand experence.
 
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Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Thanks for the heads up on the wood, I was looking at that and doing some research on it
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

My friend Donnie put together a Tele out of it and he loves it, raves about it actually
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

I've been trying to track down a reliable source of this lumber and have come up blank so far. Even tried to get Guitarfetish to get me some...no go. I love light weight guitars and would love to try this wood out. I hope you get some feedback on this thread.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

As someone that owned 20+ Paulownia guitars -

Yes, it sounds great. Yes, the wood is SOFT and light. It's perfect for hardtail guitars, or 6 screw tremolos if you don't use them that much.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Old thread... so resurrect it now.... Looking at a telecaster body made of this stuff.... is the wood really soft or prone to stripping out screw holes?
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

It's very soft, but I haven't stripped a screwhole yet. Sounds good. About as light as basswood in my experience.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Interesting that there are radically different grades of it. Cheap paulownia is soft and of little value, instrument and furniture grade is denser, and harder to cultivate in bulk. Good grades are probably heavier than basswood, rather than lighter.

Most of the nasty comments I've heard about it are from bargain bin guitars not likely to use a decent grade of it.

I know Sterling [by Music Man] is using it in their Silo series.

It's often described as somewhere between basswood and mahogany in tone. But again, that's the higher end...
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

My strat kit is paulownia aka empress wood. Very light weight, very bright sounding. TONS of treble with a JB Jr in the bridge and Five-Two single coils in neck and middle. Rosewood finger board FWIW. I can't play it without rolling off the tone.

It is soft, but I haven't stripped any screw holes. I do like it, but perhaps pick some darker sounding pickups.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

I bought a GFS Paulownia cream colored tele body, Edenhaus Maple neck, Seymour Duncan 59 in the neck and an Antiquity tele pickup in the bridge. This is an outstanding guitar with tone that is over the top. Very light and would make an excellent recording or gigging guitar.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Anyone know what Paulownia is related to? I've heard of its use for guitars, but I have no direct experience.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Mincer you peaked my curosity. So it's also referred to as the "other balsa." Fastest growing commercial hardwood with about a 3 year harvest time. Resistant to disease, elements and high temperature.

Sent from my SM-G935P using Tapatalk
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

Actually, I tried the new Brad Paisley Tele which has this wood for the body. I like it! If it weren't for the edge of the Tele body digging into my ribs (all Teles without contours do this to me), I'd consider it. I'd like to explore other body styles with this wood.
 
Re: Paulownia wood for guitars

I had a couple of the cheap GFS Palouwina guitars, they were nice, but dented real easily. And I did strip out a couple holes, switching stuff around (as you do on a partscaster). I did get Minwax "Wood Hardener" and douse the bridge screw area to make sure that didn't pull out. Honestly I couldn't tell any "tone difference" between the Pal. bodies and the heavier ones I replaced them with.
 
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