Top Woods

[guitarfreak]

Hi. Can anyone tell me why "sitka spruce" used as a top wood on Taylors (primarily) have such appeal? There's some 616ce's I've found that use a different wood (forget the type) and people comment that it's not as good as the sitka spruce (which, according to Taylor, is used on approx. 85% of their A/E's.

Please bear with my ignorance but isn't there better woods for overall sound quality than spruce as a top wood?

[rickc]

Taylor uses primarily Sitka, Adirondack and Engleman along with some Koa and Mahogony tops. I prefer Sitka over all of the others, I think it has a warmer tone. I find Engleman to bit a bit too tight sounding, Adirondack on a larger guitar sounds pretty good also. The worst sounding Taylor I've owned was one of the most expensive ones and the most beautiful looking guitars but it was an all koa with a koa top and it was completely dead sounding. Sold it in a week

[Blues Dues]

Sept 23, 2009 11:41:05 GMT -5 rickc said:

Taylor uses primarily Sitka, Adirondack and Engleman along with some Koa and Mahogony tops. I prefer Sitka over all of the others, I think it has a warmer tone. I find Engleman to bit a bit too tight sounding, Adirondack on a larger guitar sounds pretty good also. The worst sounding Taylor I've owned was one of the most expensive ones and the most beautiful looking guitars but it was an all koa with a koa top and it was completely dead sounding. Sold it in a week

How about cedar? Some people seem to praise it, others don't like it. I know Taylor offers cedar tops as an option on at least some of their guitars.

RCE

[rickc]

Yup forgot Cedar, I love cedar as a top wood for Fingerstyle playing, it is even warmer sounding than sitka but it doesn't handle heavy strumming very well, it breaks up before sitka. I do love the way it looks though.

[gdobro]

I don't know anything about wood, but came across a good picture of a sitka spruce tree. That would make a nice guitar someday.

Attachments: