Mate it's all good this end. The one thing I want people to understand about me on this subject is that it is purely discussion, not argument.

Now onto nuts, something I've researched quite deeply into. Brass, bone, corian, plastic. It all makes no difference at all once you fret a note. You've effectively cut short the speaking length of the string when you fret a note. You'll feel vibrations behind the fretted note, but they don't sound do they? You don't get a open E underlying every note you fret on the E string.
Onto bridge/trem blocks. Did you use the same strings for each block? Probably not, eh it's bad form isn't it. I don't think the change in sound is that marked a difference in all reality. I think it too is another subject that is completely overhyped. I won't say that it makes no difference. Just not as much difference as some make out. Also I think that the majority of the difference comes from a better, flatter, tighter join between tremplate and block. I think if you machined the top a zinc block flat. To the point of it being close to a perfectly closed join to the tremplate, as a lot of higher end bridge systems are. You'd notice hardly any difference at all.
However what you do find with zinc blocks is that they are budget things. Their made on the cheap out of a cheap material.
It's all about contact, what the string contacts effects it. Unless you're playing fretless the string doesn't contact any wooden part.

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Ok Niki...Keep on keeping on....lets go down farther than the bridge—the springs. Do they make any difference in the sound? Let's say, floating verses a blocked trem? How about spring vibrations as they counter the tension of the strings when the trem is floating? What is you take, mate?

Oh the thingy I sent you needs a new battery. I forgot to put one in when I sent it....

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Xhefri's Guitars
www.xhefriguitars.com

Well yes, as soon as you fret everything changes but the question is "would not a brass nut change the tone of a open string? Yes or no?

Would a thicker steel bar change the tone vs. a thin one or one of another material? Yes or no.

And on the above, same guitar, same strings, everything the same but a different nut or different bar.

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I remember when we were free!

Very interesting discussion, and I have to say I enjoyed reading Nutter's post, it was very educational.

The physics of sound.

Sound is energy, it travels through space, it will decay over time as it travels, it can be altered either through contact with other sound energy or contact with matter, physical stuff.

Sounds travels better the more dense the material it travels through. Sound travels through liquid, think sonar.

To make a sound proof room, build a room within a room, so the inside room has as little physical contact with the outside room as possible. A vaccum separating the two would be best. A vaccum has no matter in it.

Sound can be reflected. In home audio sub woofers can become very boomy, the lower freq sound waves bounce around the room, interact and can amplify certain frequencies. often around 60 hz, first harmonic, 120 hz second harminic etc. Hi end gear tests a rooms accoustics and compensates digitally. Or move the subs around to reduce the booming, or use sound absorbant panels to absorb some of it. In the home audio world they know even the shape of the front of the speakers, baffle, the placement of the drivers on the baffle all make a difference. Because the sound waves reflect and interacts.

For the performers out there, you know every venue sounds different. Your sound interacts with the surroundings, reflects back to you and you sence the difference.

A quitar body is mechanically connected to the strings, the nut glued to the head and the bridge tail piece to the body. The energy from the strings travels through these mechanical connections into the body, also into your body and hands ( I know you feel it).

This energy is absorbed and released back (you all rememeber Isaac Newton, energy is neither created nor destroyed) through the nut and bridge tail piece back into the strings and interacts, in some small way, with the ongoing good vibrations in the string. Some sound energy is turned into heat, very little, and I create much less heat than EVH does.

Simple physics.

That's why different tone woods sound different, that's why the different desity of woods impact the sound frequency spectrum differently.

What's better, or best, that's subjective, only you can decide. The room your playing in probably has more impact, size, density of the walls/floor/ceiling, shape of the room, sound absorbing furniture/window treatments, sound absorbing people in the room etc.

Should be evident why a solid body and a hollow or semi hollow all sound different.

I don't think string thickness changes the tone of a guitar at all. It changes the way a pickup responds to the string because a thicker string has increased tension to get it into tune. A .009 uses a lot less tension than a .011 for example. Because of that, when you strike the string you'll get more movement out of a .009 than you will a .011.
Yes a nut does change the sound of a string when played open.
I don't think material comes into it with tremblocks. Contact and size yes, material not to any appreciable degree.

Xhefri I've a block I've use for blocking off trems. A nice lump of pine, cut to make as much contact as possible between body and trem. I've used it in my customshop and Deluxe strats. It's currently in my claptonized dogs dinner MIM. It's never changed the sound of any of my guitars one iota.

Batteries eh? I better hurry up and get Bubbah Fett built. Not a fuzz but you're gonna love it.

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No no and no

You have to take points A and B for number 9 and consider what they are connected too and the effect it has on the sine wave form and speed/wave decay (sustain of the wave) and for your point number ten (10) you also have to consider your (A) the fret is connected to (maple, rosewood, mahogany) effects sound as well.

The pickup again only amplifies to string how the string vibrates is depended on the body, neck , hardware , mass. Change anyone of them you change the vibration of the string and the way the pickup amplifies it. Why do you think some guitars have more sustain with the same pickups then others even if they are the same scale length? The pickup is not magically changing the sustain from one to the other. So why is that?

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The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Thomas Jefferson

A pickup works on the same principle as an electrical motor and electrical generator.

Pass a metal object through a magnetic field and produce electricity.

The strings are metal, thicker strings have more material so procduce different levels of energy.

So, the metal string passing through the magnetic field procduces electricity. This electrical current moves along your cables to the amp when it is amplified.

the speaker works in reverse, it takes in the electrical signal from the amp, and uses magnets and coils to move the cone and produce sound. And heat, the internals of the spreaker (driver) will heat up.

Exactly, a guitar is a system, you are dealing with mass, energy and vibration axis. When you impart energy to the system every part absorbs energy to some degree or another, in this case vibration, altering the mass of any part, or relationship alters how the system distributes and dissipates energy.

Does changing the mass of neck, body alter the system. Absolutely.
The degree of vibration influences the length and arc of the string, in minute but tangible ways. That is why a stratocaster with a solid rubber body, or brass one, glass, meat, concrete, aluminum (would) or for that matter different cuts of wood distribute an dissipate energy characteristically different.

I am quite satisfied this is the answer. Can I quote formulas, no. Can I explain the occurrence or lack thereof of "wolf tones". Well those occur more or less depending on the player and instrument. I understand violins, cellos etc are capable, its no big mystery.

Can someone make a good sounding guitar with something other than wood, absolutely, and perhaps there is something out there better than wood. Are all Alder cuts the same, and all Ash cuts brighter, no. Is amplification and distortion, gain, effects easier to manipulate, yes.

However, I cannot accept that the string is somehow isolated by the nut and bridge and somehow immune to energy distribution and resonance of other parts of the system, guitars are just not made that stiffly.

If I believed that I certainly would not be purchasing high end guitars when a low end model with nice pickups would accomplish the same thing.

I have enjoyed this debate and want to thank you all for your input, especially Niki as he has been most patient. I am under no illusion that this is the last installment, and anyone will accept my explanation but I am new to this venue and had not run across the topic yet. At this point I am satisfied, and am pleased to announce I found my copy of "science and music" a text from the late 1930's. I will be reading more on this topic and perhaps can contribute some hard science, formulas, laws to the debate in the future.

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I remember when we were free!

Scale length and set up. Never had a guitar that couldn't sustain a note as well as any other guitar.

If the string acts on the wood, causing it to vibrate. How does that same wood act on the string that is causing the action? How does that not disrupt or distort the original signal?

Cmon answer the question, preferably not with a question, it's getting tiresome. Lets get a few definites rather than marketing hype eh?

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It does. Well not exactly the origianl signal, by the time the vibrations move back from the body through the nut / bridge and into the strings it is a new vibrations coming from the strings. In comparison the vibrations from the wood moving back to the strings are much weaker but they still exist.

It is not a one way street from string to body. It is a feed back loop that doesn't stop until all the vibrations stop.

And the density of the wood's body (and size and shape) will impact the intensity and frequency spectrum of the vibration begin reflected back.

Ok being as though that vibration must be out of sync with the vibration of the string, how does it not cause signal degradation by acting against the vibrating string?

How does it not cause something like the wolf note you get when a pickup is too close to the string? After all it would undoubtedly cause a variation of the string movement. Why don't we hear other notes coming through as the hertz cycle is added to by the off string vibrations?

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No no and no

Niki,


I am not sure I can give you what your asking for right now. But think of sympathetic vibration, resonance does not have to be destructive or interfere.

This is very interesting, stimulating, and educational. Like I said I am going to do some reading and let you know what I come up with sometime in the future. Right now I have expended enough energy and time on this debate and really need to focus on my work, or get in trouble in many ways.

Think symphony and not cacophony, part of what we love about guitar.

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I remember when we were free!

The feed back vibration is out of sync in amplitude, frequency and timing. It will interact; combine, amplify, cancel, modify etc the new vibrations. It will be unpredictable, so no two guitars will ever sound exactly the same, ever. I'm talking sound sensitivity beyond human hearing.

I'm not sure what a wolf note it. But a pickup works via moving metal mass passing through a magnetic field creating an electric current. The vibrations in the body only impact the sound coming out of the pickups by modifying the movement of the string through the magnetic field.