@Tom_Gilroy, so if I understand correctly, you’re saying that the vibrations of the body/neck and the strings themselves do not interfere with each other because they are of different types, right? That makes sense to me.
Am I also right to interpret the situation as follows: while the waves do not interfere in the classical sense, a wave on the string will transfer some, albeit very small, energy to a wave in the body or more likely the neck and that this could in theory affect the tone if that transfer became significant? The reality, though, is that for a well-designed and well-built guitar that energy transfer is minimal and thus has little, if any, perceptible impact on tone.
Sorry to dig up and older post. I’m finally getting around to getting caught up and had a couple questions.
I haven’t seen evidence to convince me that wood properties have any significant impact on amplified tone of a solidbody electric guitar, but as @Tom_Gilroy observes, the appropriate method for answering the question would be a rigorous study involving blind listening tests.
But folks sometimes make arguments disputing the availability of a plausible mechanism for the wood to make a difference, and I don’t think those arguments are particularly persuasive. I think there’s a plausible mechanism, but solid wood bodies are similar enough that there’s not enough difference for a noticeable effect on the amplified sound.
Regardless of whether we’re talking about transfer of energy from a vibrating string to the body and neck through the bridge, nut, and frets, or transfer of energy to the surrounding air, we absolutely do know that the vibration of the string decays. Pick a note and see how long it takes for it to die. You’ve just witness the string losing all of the energy you put in when you picked it.
The key questions are: do the various overtone frequencies of the string’s vibration decay at significantly different rates? Further, if the overtones decay at significantly different rates, do those differences in rate of decay among overtones differ significantly for solid wood bodies with different properties? I suspect the answer to the first question is yes. While I suspect the answer to the second question is no, that’s where I think the “hope” springs from for tonewood advocates, even if they aren’t able to articulate it. Even if the answer to that latter question is yes, I agree with @Tom_Gilroy 's point that variations of properties even among samples of the same species would render generalizations about tonal effect of wood species moot. I also suspect that if a rigorous clinical investigation did reveal patterns in blind listening tests, the audible differences would be small enough to be matched by minor adjustments to the EQ settings of a typical amplifier.
And a final note: I think a major flaw in many anecdotal listening tests is that they don’t isolate the amplified signal from the acoustic vibration of the guitar body. That is, people are hearing the acoustic vibration of the guitar body (through the air) at close range at the same time they are listening to the amplified signal. Headphones or extremely loud amp volume might overcome this, but the most foolproof solution would be to put the amp and listener in a different room from the guitar.
Yes, the vibration of the neck and body are longitudinal waves, and the vibrations on the strings are transverse waves. In the sense of wave interference, they do not interfere with one another.
However, the waves can certainly interact. As @Frylock mentions, any plucked string will eventually stop vibrating. That energy has been lost from the strings to drive the longitudinal vibration of the frets, bridge, neck, body, etc, as well as the surrounding air.
Eventually, all the energy of the string is dissipated into the guitar and the surrounding environment as heat.
The important thing to note is that if an electric guitar is well designed and well built, the loss of energy from the string to the rest of the guitar doesn’t drastically change as we move from one note to another.
@Frylock’s post was an excellent addition, and there really isn’t much more to be said.
@Tom_Gilroy and @Frylock, thanks for the responses, a lot of great info in there!
By the way, I don’t disagree with any of the ideas you guys are posting here regarding the effect (or lack thereof) of the wood on tone in an electric guitar. I just wanted a little better understanding of the whole issue.
I wonder how much I’ll be paying to get it to england though, I have been thinking of getting that type of clamp. I’ve seen cheap ones on ebay… But that’s a gamble.
Did you feel you had to adjust to the body shape, or was it instantly comfortable? Do you normally plant your forearm, and did this feel different with the Steinberger?
I used to anchor with my palm, so can’t say if it would affect someone who relies on the forearm anchor. But I know going back to a normal guitar was akward. The Steinberger is very comfy though. The one thing to keep in mind is if you grip chords to hard it can be hard to slide around as it moves the guitar more than a normal guitar moves.
I don’t think it’s anything serious tho, they are great guitars.
If you are willing to sit near the edge of your chair and put the V part on your right leg, and cross your ankles, you’ll get your most ergonomic guitar. I discovered this by myself and was shocked that I didn’t see it before, but it turns out that other people have figured it out as well, and it’s even documented on YouTube; so, don’t delay, get a V, they’re the best!
