MIMF

hello ,I'm new to the forum and have been building guitars and dulcimers for about three years now as a hobby. I have my own sawmill and have been doing carpentry and woodworking since the early 80s. Since starting guitar building I've been trying so far to experiment with wood that grows local (or used to grow ) to me here in east Tn. My first question is have any of you used american chestnut in an acoustic guitar build and how did it turn out? I have searched alot online and have found almost no acoustic guitars using this wood,I have found some info on some builders making dulcimers from it though.

Chestnut is soft, and somewhat open grained. I've seen it, but never worked with it. I would worry about it crushing on the inside of a tight bend, such as the waist of a guitar. I've had that problem with butternut, which is similar in density and grain structure. Dulcimers don't usually have such tight bends, and I have used that for dulcimers.

I'd be on the lookout for persimmon, and black locust. Persimmon is the American member of the ebony family, and although it's not often black it's a good substitute otherwise. Black locust is a sort of 'improved' Indian rosewood: the density, stiffness, and hardness, are similar, but it has lower damping; more like Brazilian rosewood than Indian. The color is not as attractive, but it turns quite dark when fumed with ammonia. Osage orange is not native to your area, but could easily have been introduced as a hedge tree in the past. I have head of it growing in your area, iirc. It's a BRW substitute. Oak, cherry and any nut wood you run across are good candidates. I've been wanting to try hickory for a long time, but it's hard to find in commerce around here, and I've only gotten some quartered stock fairly recently. Leafing through my tree book it looks as though you should be inundated with suitable hardwoods.

I would use it for blocks and linings. I think it was used for that kind of musical instrument casework before the bug hit and wiped it all out.
If I recall it’s pretty stable and matches the shrinkage rates of typical tone woods like EIR.

Thanks for the replies. Here are some pics of an all chestnut I have already started. I have some american chestnut that was saved from an old piano that does seem very soft. But the wood I used for this guitar I sawed from a log that had been buried at the edge of a creek for at least 90 years and is really pretty hard. It seemed to bend good to . I just had to try it for the top to just to see what it will sound like. I'm planning to build another one with a different soundboard wood just to compare the sound. Sorry for the bad photography.

Welcome to the MIMF, James!

I like it, and will be interested to see how it sounds. Probably not something that's going to grab the market by storm, but "just to see what it sounds like" is right in line with my own maker interests. I'm glad there's room for experimenters and dabblers and pros all here on the same forum.

I know you said American Chestnut, but someone on another forum had a link to this guy, and he has a phenomenal piece of Italian Chestnut. He really likes everything about the wood. Not the least is its looks.

https://kenparkerarchtops.com/etude-applying-finish

The most exciting wood here in Ga I have found is sycamore I got from a small sawmill in Perry Ga several years ago. I found it beautiful AND IT HAS A good reputation. I got a beautiful Osage log from here in North Atlanta But the color didn't excite me. Sound is great.

With a sawmill you might find sycamore and produce beautiful quarter sawn Guitar sets. I have checked other sawmill that offer it but it doesn't have the beauty of the first from Perry.

Osage takes on a much nicer color when ammonia fumed.

Thanks for the positive comments. Bob I' ve got some sycamore air drying in the shed along with plenty of walnut,cherry,maple,paulownia and a few others. I don't have any osage but I am using mulberry for my next acoustic guitar neck and I may try a locust for a neck in the near future . The american chestnut I posted pics of will get a walnut neck.

Alan Carruth wrote: ↑Fri Apr 16, 2021 10:20 am Osage takes on a much nicer color when ammonia fumed.

I tried Black and dark brown transtint dye but looks splotchy. I did not try fuming but will now.

James Maden wrote: ↑Fri Apr 16, 2021 6:10 pm Thanks for the positive comments. Bob I' ve got some sycamore air drying in the shed along with plenty of walnut,cherry,maple,paulownia and a few others. I don't have any osage but I am using mulberry for my next acoustic guitar neck and I may try a locust for a neck in the near future . The american chestnut I posted pics of will get a walnut neck.

How did the grain pattern come out. Mine looks like snake skin. It was a 12" wide board so from big tree.

I have a chestnut Reso that my uncle built back in the late eighties, there is quite a story that goes with it, I was working with him when he built it and he told me that at that time the wood was 75 yrs old, so I am assuming that the chestnut was harvested around the time of the blight that wiped them out, anyway I know for sure he built 2 of them, takes to much time to tell the story, so in short, he must have sold or traded it shortly after building it so it eventually wound up in california then traveled back to tennessee, where a kind soul I met gave it back to me as gift back to the family this was around 2003 my uncle was killed in a tragic accident in 1998, it is a beautifull instrument with great volume, makes a great reso, im not sure if it would make a good regular six string, because great sound for a reso has more to do with set up, so I cant compare, I will try to post a couple of photos when I figure out how to resize them

Bob , my sycamore is still drying so I haven't planed any of it yet to really see what it will look like. JW ,thanks for posting pics of your guitar, glad you got it back . Your chestnut doesn't look anything like mine .Do you remember what finish your uncle used on it? Looks like it has held up well.

Nitro- I don’t know that he ever used anything else- yup! Glad to get it back! I still remember the day he got killed, he was standing in front of his shop and a fella fell asleep at the wheel and ran off the road and hit him, he was killed instantly, he had recently had a prostrate operation and couldn’t move out of the way fast enough, he was 72 yrs old- a lot of his mandolins and guitars are still around mostly in sc and Georgia