Rosewood Question

Gary Moore was a monster on guitar. Amazing feel.

As to bbb's post, in the electric guitar world, Brazilian (or other) rosewoods for that matter are usually used on the fretboard. Examples would be 1958 and up Strats, Les Pauls... A couple exceptions would be a unique solid Brazilian rosewood neck made for a 50's Cal-Mex guitarist, and the all-rosewood Telecaster that George Harrison played.

I once owned a guitar made with a 70's Mighty Mite body and Schecter neck, all solid East Indian Rosewood (that I sold to someone in the UK). As one would expect, the sustain is stupid unreal. The downside is that, in my opinion, the guitar had so much mass that the string's vibrations were not "affected" by the woods, so to speak, and the sound was a bit "metallic". On a Les Paul, the top wood is maple, over Honduras mahogany. I'm not a fan of all-mahogany electrics as they can sound too dark, but the maple cap on the Les Paul adds some brightness (as well as beauty.) And as they only made a couple hundred sunburst LP's between '58 and '60, they're stupid ridiculously expensive.

Martin predominantly used ebony for fretboards, but have moved to Richlite (a phenolic) for many of their current guitars.

How does this relate to pool cues? My guess is that for someone who is fast, maybe plays a lot of 9-ball, has a pretty firm stroke, more deliberate in their shot-making, gets to the next shot before the OB falls in the pocket, he/she would find they like maple or play better with maple, for the handles. And I would also guess that one who maybe more feel-oriented, plays at a slower pace, moves the ball around less, has more short finesse shots, may prefer or perform better butt made of tropical hardwoods. And maybe a combination of both types of woods lead to a good all-around cue. The balance and feel adjusted by how far from the joint the splice starts, for example....
 
KJ Cues said:
Very, very cool vid. He's considerably younger there. I'm sure he'd changed guitars
oh, maybe 100 times since then. Stained Maple ??? I thought we talking about the fret-brd.
That's the long pc of wood that sits on the neck. Definitely needs to be a tone-wood.
Click to expand...

When Leo Fender made the first Telecaster in 1951 (originally called the Broadcaster), the necks were a solid piece of maple. The Stratocaster came out in 1954, also with all-maple neck. Leo was watching TV, as the story goes, and saw his Strat being played, and noticed the "wear marks" on the fretboard. He then started using rosewood on the fretboards in 1958. A lot of bluegrass (chickin' pickin'), country, rock, and metal players like the way maple boards play. The more blues-influenced players seem to prefer rosewood fretboards, generally. I think that stems from the "feel" of the response of the strings. The strings in my opinion seem to respond and decay faster with maple fretboards. Rosewoods I feel make the vibration "bloom" slower as well as decay slower.

On acoustic instruments, the primary reason is wear, which is why ebony is dominant, and traditional. All bowed instruments use ebony fretboards, and the strings touch the fretboard directly.
 
Starting to like your input Louie. Please don't insult me again and I'll be an all eyes/ears student.
Your last paragraph (in your last post #82) is an interesting opinion. I never looked at it like that
and I play 9-ball exclusively (well, used to). For me, wood choice is about the hit,
what your grip hand feels when striking the ball. Too much speed around the table can lead to 'accidents'.

OK, now I have to reference post #82. You're too quick.
 
KJ Cues said:
Starting to like your input Louie. Please don't insult me again and I'll be an all eyes/ears student.
Your last paragraph (in your last post #82) is an interesting opinion. I never looked at it like that
and I play 9-ball exclusively (well, used to). For me, wood choice is about the hit,
what your grip hand feels when striking the ball. Too much speed around the table can lead to 'accidents'.

OK, now I have to reference post #82. You're too quick.
Click to expand...

I was reacting to what I thought was excessive over-reaction and assumptions. I promise, I'm mostly good natured in person. I'm a ball-breaker though, but if you don't see my hand gestures and devilish grin, it may not seem like ball-breaking. The emoji I used, admittedly, may have not been the best-suited. In person, I'd make you laugh so hard you'd cry...:grin:

As to the referenced paragraph, I tend to be more offense than defense, take some risks, like to move the ball around, prefer to hit the ball firm, chase the CB around the table... and I find my hand likes the "crisp" sensation of maple butts - regardless of joint material. I've hit a rosewood handled cue before, but not Brazilian. From what I understand, East Indian rosewood's "Q" value is about 80-85% that of Brazilian rosewood. Someone at my local pool hall has an EIR cue, and I'll have to try it again to confirm my theory.
 
Your suggestion of "would you use the BRW as a core for a birdseye maple outer veneer?"
isn't as far fetched as what you might think. I'll wager there's a young, up & coming CM
sitting in his basement shop right now trying to figure-out how to make that work.
In all honesty, it's an interesting concept. That is, if I were inclined to core.
If there were more BRW to be had, it might be worth someones time for experimentation.
Oh well, Thanx.
 
KJ Cues said:
Your suggestion of "would you use the BRW as a core for a birdseye maple outer veneer?"
isn't as far fetched as what you might think. I'll wager there's a young, up & coming CM
sitting in his basement shop right now trying to figure-out how to make that work.
In all honesty, it's an interesting concept. That is, if I were inclined to core.
If there were more BRW to be had, it might be worth someones time for experimentation.
Oh well, Thanx.
Click to expand...

Well, if you had scraps/drop-offs, you could make a blank out of a lamination of BRW scraps, turn down the forearm area 1/8" following the butt taper, taper-core an oversize maple forearm blank, glue it, then cut the maple down to match, this making a 1/8" maple veneer over a full BRW blank. Do the same thing at the butt (with a straight bore obviously) and install a wrap to hide the rest of the BRW. It would be a sleeper cue. Looks like maple, hits like BRW... You'd suck in some unsuspecting rube into your maple plain Jane ruse next time you play.
 
Love where this is going, all of my research about tonal qualities of wood seemed to go back to musical instarments. I'm fairly certain musical qualitys of wood mean just as much to pool cues and the way they play as instruments. That's why Bushka demanded straight grain woods for all his cues.
Keep it going guys, lots of great info!
 
Jon Manning said:
Love where this is going, all of my research about tonal qualities of wood seemed to go back to musical instarments. I'm fairly certain musical qualitys of wood mean just as much to pool cues and the way they play as instruments. That's why Bushka demanded straight grain woods for all his cues.
Keep it going guys, lots of great info!
Click to expand...

Back in the early days of guitar building, there was no industrial revolution, no saw mills, lumber yards. A luthier would obtain a tree or logs, split the logs, and let mother nature dry them. When a log is split radially, the billets are all purely quartered with absolutely no run-off. Because of the contiguous grain, the plates could be planed thinner, while still retaining enough strength.

As to planing - because the wood was perfectly quartered with no run-off, subsequent operations that were all done by hand - planing, bending, carving, scraping - become subsequently easier to do. Of course, they used fiddle back and bird's eye maple back then, but the species in Europe is a bit softer, and the hand-skills and knowledge of the artisans were and are second to none. So there is a practical aspect to using perfectly quartered woods as well. I'm sure many newbies don't think much about this stuff with the advent of low-cost CNC, but they don't realize how much knowledge of hand-work goes a long way into understanding how machines cut wood.

I should point out that we use the term "Holy Grail" for woods, and there are in terms of scarcity and beauty, but I think the acoustic guitar world is always looking for that next BRW alternative, when in fact there are plenty of great domestic woods. George Lowden, of Lowden Guitars in Ireland, makes some of the best sounding acoustic guitars in my opinion - my favorite being his Redwood/ABW guitars. He also makes incredible guitars out of Western Red Cedar paired with Claro or Bastogne Walnut, showing that one man's domestic is another man's exotic import. Nothing will replace Red Spruce/BRW as the prototypical guitar sound, but there are so many other sounds available if we just open our ears, or try that cue out...

The man himself... the whole video series is great to watch/listen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lov_ystdnUA
 
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LEARNING via ASSUMPTION

Everything that I write to the forum is opinion unless it can be supported by fact.
Some of my opinions are based on assumption because I haven't yet found proof.
This is one of ways that we (at least me) learn. The hope in making assumption is that
at some point, someone with greater knowledge will step-in and say "wait, that's incorrect",
regarding the opinion being offered. Louie is correct, I do make assumptions.
These assumptions are based on previously acquired knowledge: I'm not a 'dumb' guy.
At this point I'd like to offer my definition of the difference btwn ignorance and stupidity.
Basically, ignorance is not knowing or lack of knowledge. I'm ignorant in many fields.
I know nothing of nuclear fusion or quantum physics. That makes me ignorant in those fields.
Stupidity would be for me to make statements as if they were facts in either of those areas.
I do try to avoid doing that in offering opinion and I'm waiting to be corrected.
If I'm wrong, tell me I'm wrong so that I can learn. You better have facts though or credibility.
I can stand the hit, I put myself up for it because I want to learn, specifically: resonance.
Louie has much greater knowledge in that area so I'm bouncing my opinions off him in hopes of
being corrected or being confirmed. 'Pretty' in a cue is not my first concern, resonance is.
I don't deliberately make an ugly cue but it's not the end of the world if it happens as long
as the cue has such a pleasing hit that you can't put it down. A lot of builders build for pretty.

I'm prepared to offer an opinion on full-splice cues and their difference from cored cues.
F/S construction more closely resembles guitar construction because of the greater flat-surface
contact area of the finger/prongs even though those prongs are V-shaped, the mating surfaces are flat.
Louie did scold me regarding the use of foam-glue but I'm not sure he's aware of how many builders
actually do use it in their construction of cored cues. My guess, probably 1/2.
IMO, foam-glue has no place in a cue. That's why I 'sarcastically' asked: What's the resonance factor
of foam-glue ? Hopefully, some of those builders picked-up on Louie's response.
I took the hit for the team so to speak. Hopefully someone, somewhere learned or I've been hit for naught.
Just a tad more sarcasm for the sake of learning. Have you ever seen a F/S done with foam-glue ?
Directed at no one in particular, more along the lines of 'food for thought'.

At this point I'm just waiting for the bell so I can go have a smoke and maybe a coffee.
Otherwise I'm going back to bed. Lol

Peace-out, KJ
 
louieatienza said:
Gary Moore was a monster on guitar. Amazing feel.

As to bbb's post, in the electric guitar world, Brazilian (or other) rosewoods for that matter are usually used on the fretboard. Examples would be 1958 and up Strats, Les Pauls... A couple exceptions would be a unique solid Brazilian rosewood neck made for a 50's Cal-Mex guitarist, and the all-rosewood Telecaster that George Harrison played.

I once owned a guitar made with a 70's Mighty Mite body and Schecter neck, all solid East Indian Rosewood (that I sold to someone in the UK). As one would expect, the sustain is stupid unreal. The downside is that, in my opinion, the guitar had so much mass that the string's vibrations were not "affected" by the woods, so to speak, and the sound was a bit "metallic". On a Les Paul, the top wood is maple, over Honduras mahogany. I'm not a fan of all-mahogany electrics as they can sound too dark, but the maple cap on the Les Paul adds some brightness (as well as beauty.) And as they only made a couple hundred sunburst LP's between '58 and '60, they're stupid ridiculously expensive.

Martin predominantly used ebony for fretboards, but have moved to Richlite (a phenolic) for many of their current guitars.

How does this relate to pool cues? My guess is that for someone who is fast, maybe plays a lot of 9-ball, has a pretty firm stroke, more deliberate in their shot-making, gets to the next shot before the OB falls in the pocket, he/she would find they like maple or play better with maple, for the handles. And I would also guess that one who maybe more feel-oriented, plays at a slower pace, moves the ball around less, has more short finesse shots, may prefer or perform better butt made of tropical hardwoods. And maybe a combination of both types of woods lead to a good all-around cue. The balance and feel adjusted by how far from the joint the splice starts, for example....
Click to expand...

Gary Moore...This guy was a monster Probably one of my favorite guitarist of all time. The solo work he does with Bob Daisley on Empty Rooms, Live from Stockholm in 87, or 89 I believe is nothing short of virtuoso, IMO. Here is a link.
https://youtu.be/P3dapDTDJzk
Enjoy.
 
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KJ Cues said:
Everything that I write to the forum is opinion unless it can be supported by fact.
Some of my opinions are based on assumption because I haven't yet found proof.
This is one of ways that we (at least me) learn. The hope in making assumption is that
at some point, someone with greater knowledge will step-in and say "wait, that's incorrect",
regarding the opinion being offered. Louie is correct, I do make assumptions.
These assumptions are based on previously acquired knowledge: I'm not a 'dumb' guy.
At this point I'd like to offer my definition of the difference btwn ignorance and stupidity.
Basically, ignorance is not knowing or lack of knowledge. I'm ignorant in many fields.
I know nothing of nuclear fusion or quantum physics. That makes me ignorant in those fields.
Stupidity would be for me to make statements as if they were facts in either of those areas.
I do try to avoid doing that in offering opinion and I'm waiting to be corrected.
If I'm wrong, tell me I'm wrong so that I can learn. You better have facts though or credibility.
I can stand the hit, I put myself up for it because I want to learn, specifically: resonance.
Louie has much greater knowledge in that area so I'm bouncing my opinions off him in hopes of
being corrected or being confirmed. 'Pretty' in a cue is not my first concern, resonance is.
I don't deliberately make an ugly cue but it's not the end of the world if it happens as long
as the cue has such a pleasing hit that you can't put it down. A lot of builders build for pretty.

I'm prepared to offer an opinion on full-splice cues and their difference from cored cues.
F/S construction more closely resembles guitar construction because of the greater flat-surface
contact area of the finger/prongs even though those prongs are V-shaped, the mating surfaces are flat.
Louie did scold me regarding the use of foam-glue but I'm not sure he's aware of how many builders
actually do use it in their construction of cored cues. My guess, probably 1/2.
IMO, foam-glue has no place in a cue. That's why I 'sarcastically' asked: What's the resonance factor
of foam-glue ? Hopefully, some of those builders picked-up on Louie's response.
I took the hit for the team so to speak. Hopefully someone, somewhere learned or I've been hit for naught.
Just a tad more sarcasm for the sake of learning. Have you ever seen a F/S done with foam-glue ?
Directed at no one in particular, more along the lines of 'food for thought'.

At this point I'm just waiting for the bell so I can go have a smoke and maybe a coffee.
Otherwise I'm going back to bed. Lol

Peace-out, KJ
Click to expand...

Well my words on epoxy were in your response to your blanket statement about the use of PU glues for cores.

That said, guitar building is just as much a process of attenuating frequencies as much as enhancing them. Probably one reason why certain tips play well with a certain cue but not another. I don't know, but there may be some benefit to the "decoupling" of certain wood-core combinations as well. That may fly in the face of the "purity" of construction, but that in an of itself never pocketed balls.

Another point is that PU glue would only foam up in the presence of water. There is a trace amount of moisture in wood, but if your fitment is right and you don't introduce water it shouldn't look like window sealant. I've even used it for guitar back bracing.
 
louieatienza said:
Well my words on epoxy were in your response to your blanket statement about the use of PU glues for cores.

That said, guitar building is just as much a process of attenuating frequencies as much as enhancing them. Probably one reason why certain tips play well with a certain cue but not another. I don't know, but there may be some benefit to the "decoupling" of certain wood-core combinations as well. That may fly in the face of the "purity" of construction, but that in an of itself never pocketed balls.

Another point is that PU glue would only foam up in the presence of water. There is a trace amount of moisture in wood, but if your fitment is right and you don't introduce water it shouldn't look like window sealant. I've even used it for guitar back bracing.
Click to expand...
And free space.
This is a can of worms altogether.

That coring dowel runs down the center of the sleeve.
Let's say it has foamed wall around it.
Doesn't the resonance from the face to the bottom run better b/c that resonance is not escaping through the side of wood?
I'm talking about forearms, not handles.

Not being a jip but, but we're talking resonance on butts but a lot of shafts out here have hollowed ends. That kills resonance a lot more than coring butts imo.
 
JoeyInCali said:
And free space.
This is a can of worms altogether.

That coring dowel runs down the center of the sleeve.
Let's say it has foamed wall around it.
Doesn't the resonance from the face to the bottom run better b/c that resonance is not escaping through the side of wood?
I'm talking about forearms, not handles.

Not being a jip but, but we're talking resonance on butts but a lot of shafts out here have hollowed ends. That kills resonance a lot more than coring butts imo.
Click to expand...

I thought we were talking about rosewood LOL!!!

As to your thought on the forearm, it is still coupled directly to the joint sleeve, which mates to the joint sleeve of the shaft, to the shaft wood... Of course, one could engineer the butt such that the outer forearm sleeve does NOT touch the joint collar and is suspended over the core with PU foam. Whether either is good or not I don't think is an issue. It would be just different, and thus to the tastes of the individual.

To the "coring" of LD shafts... It's not the resonance but the resonant frequency. In CNC machinery we add mass to dampen vibrations. This is because generally, mass will raise the resonant frequency of the part. And the opposite is true, removing mass lowers the resonant frequency. In the case of shafts, weight is removed from the tip down, so that it deflects away upon striking the CB, minimizing CB deflection from its intended path. At the same time, its resonant frequency is lowered, so in general it will be, and feel less stiff, and the hit would feel more muted than a solid shaft.

The butt in whole is around 4-5 times the weight of the shaft. In the acoustic guitar analogy I believe the butt can be thought of as the back/side wood, and the shaft the top. The CB would be the "string" that vibrates the shaft. The butt, as a base structure of the cue, can be made to attenuate (crisper hit) or extend (smoother or softer hit) the resonance of the shaft.
 
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