Domestic Woods for Fingerboards

[Craig Bumgarner]

Can anyone suggest a domestic (US or Canadian) hardwood for fingerboards that are of a hardness similar to ebony or rosewood? And dark... And with minimum pores...... And not maple....... I know, picky, picky. I've been looking, but most of the North American hardwoods are light in color and not particularly hard. The Janka hardness of walnut (1050) is a third of Ebony and EIR (3100). Locust is a little better than half (1700). Persimmon is 2300 and brown, but not very stable. Humm..... Any thoughts?

[Dave Gentner]

Osage orange 2760, desert ironwood 4000.

[Steve Senseney]

Osage works well.

I have considered treating it with iron solution to darken it, but have not done that yet.

After sun exposure for a few weeks to months, it turns to a brownish red color.

[Mario Proulx]

I've had some osage stored in a dark cabinet for a few years, and it turned a deep brown/red color on its own; I actually thought I'd found a hidden stash of cocobolo when I ran across the pieces some time back. Would make great fingerboards and bridges, methinks.

Maple also works(look at any number of Telecasters and their clones) but needs to be finished. Walnut works(hundreds of thousands of Ovations have 'em), but is rather soft. Pretty much any hard, stable, and reasonably closed-pore hardwood will do; it comes down to cosmetics more than anything.

[Mark Day]

Many moons ago someone posted here that ironwood, or American Hornbeam as a good wood for fingerboards. The thread is in limbo right now until the archives are up and running. I forgot who it was that posted it but it seems to me he hasn't been 'round these parts in a long time. No personal experience here; just passing on what I read a while back while the archives are unavailable.

Also lilac is very hard and close-pored, but it might be hard to find pieces large enough.

[Rodger Knox]

Mesquite is 2345, the pores usually aren't too big, but it's not really dark.

[Steven Wilson]

I've used locust and osage. Osage does brown very quikly, a shame becouse I like the bright yellow of fresh oasage.

[Craig Bumgarner]

Thanks for all the ideas. Don't want to choke off the thread, keep the ideas coming. Just wanted to ask if anyone has any details regarding the salt/iron/vinegar treatment to render osage black. Does it involve a lot of water? Would not think you'd want to soak a fingerboard for long. I wonder if it is permanent?

[Chuck Morrison]

I've searched a long time for the answer to this question. A fully (north) American guitar would be relatively easy but for the fret board part.The solution I found was a little known wood, Texas Ebony. Ebenopsis ebano for those who want to look it up. It is not commercially available anywhere I know of, but there are folks "down by the border" who cut it and make trinkets, bowls, carvings from it. It is not black (brown with a yellow sapwood) and I don't know if it would take a stain well. It is very hard and doesn't dry as straight as would be nice, but once it's dry it seems to stay put. I like the look of it, but that's a personal preference. I've seen it listed as 2570 on the Janka scale, so no, it isn't in that 4k range. I'll let you know in 20 years if it wears better than Rosewood.

[Michael Lewis]

Here in California there is a type of walnut that is pretty hard. It is a genetic cross between local black and English walnut called 'bastogne', and is infertile. The wood is generally grayish brown with small tight pores. It is used for rifle stocks for big bore guns as it is stronger than English walnut, which is harder and tougher than black walnut. You would have to dye it to make it dark but I think it would wear as well as any rosewood, and maybe better.

It has been proven that fingerboards do not need to be so awfully hard to work well. The wear on fingerboards I see most often is due to long fingernails and dirty hands. Keep your nails trimmed and hands fairly clean and your fingerboards, frets, and strings will all last longer.

[Tristan Williams]

You would have to dye it to make it dark

Iron acetate made with vinegar & steel wool turns walnut blacker than ebony in no time at all. Super easy to do

[Alan Carruth]

I've been using persimmon for fingerboards for some time now, with few problems. It seems to me that the ratings for 'stability' often put a lot of weight on radial/tangential shrinkage ratio, and if you use well quartered wood for the fingerboard that's not much of an issue. The color is a problem: I use a 'tea' made from black walnut hulls to dye it, and it's an acceptable brown. As Chuck Morrison said, the fingerboard is the hardest thing to find a good domestic substitute for.

Alan Carruth / Luthier

[Samuel Hartpence]

You can also get into a bit of a discussion if you start looking into invasive species. I've got a few slabs of Russian Olive (grows like a week out here) that I plan on using for finger boards and bridges. Not entirely "local" as it is an invasive species, but it's local in the fact that I can walk a block and harvest it, and I believe it will work quite well.

[Chuck Tweedy]

Oh, I just thought of one!!

Hard maple dyed with Fiebings.

Been there
done THAT.

[Arnt Rian]

Fruit woods can work well for fingerboards, at least they have a long track record for traditional instruments such as Hardanger fiddle over here. I've used pear wood for mando family instruments a few times, and it seems to hold up fine. Its quite dense, close pored and stable, but it doesn't look at all like ebony or rosewood, of course. I think its pretty interesting in its own right, though. I assume some of your local fruit tree woods are similar. Here's a picture of my MIMF $100 challenge from a couple of years ago, with a two-tone pear fingerboard (and appointments)

[Ben Fleenor]

There's an online wood dealer that occasionally sells Pistachio fingerboards. Apparently it has a fairly high Janka hardness. I don't know anything else about it though.

[Roger Rosenberger]

I have used pecan on 2 or 3 fingerboards and it worked very well. Pecan has a Janka rating of 1820 and you can get some interesting color variations.

[Alan Carruth]

I just remembered that soft shell almond makes a nice fingerboard. It's quite hard (don't know the number), dense, sand very tight grained. It looks a lot like cherry or apple. I have not had a lot of luck staining it, but then, I have not used it much either. A student gave me some from a fire wood pile years ago.

Alan Carruth / Luthier

[Al Dodson]

Anthracite? Petrified wood?

[Matthew Orifice]

i actually had this conversation with the lumber mill i get my wood from, he suggested either persimmon as it's the only native north american ebony or just using walnut (i went with the latter) oiled up it's not ugly by any means and the black walnut we got for the purpose has some beautiful grain