Official Luthiers Forum!

Dear forum members,
There is some real interesting footage of luthiers who talk about THE
RIGHT TIME TO CUT LUMBER for guitars.

What is your opinion? Do you believe in moonphases?
I would love to hear your opinion / experiences.

By the way, Claudio (from the clip) would love to trade European spruce to
some American tonewoods. Anybody interested?

All the Best,
Holger
wood.mov

I might be interested in a swap. How do I get ahold of him?

Nope, don't believe in moon phase stuff. Whenever it's easiest to get the trees outta the forest (so, winter, assuming no snow, I'd guess) would make most sense to me.

    Here in PA the best time to cut a spruce is just before you want to have it hit the ground. Actually if you are looking for the better wood it is a hit and miss. each tree is individual also you need a big tree. The larger the better becuase as they age the growth reings get tighter and here is where the better luthier grade wood will be . I have friends that were in the sawmill business most of there 75 years and learned much from them.
     That moon thing is BS.

    That moonphase philosophy has been a part of the logging practice in europe for centuries and was always a consideration of many of the violin builders there. Since the moon and its position in relation to the earth does heavily affect our tidal movements and cycles I'm guessing that's where the connection comes from. It's most likely the brainchild of an industrious wood cutter from long ago stirring up the mystic that his wood better than all of the other wood cutters because of his close attention to the moonphases. We see itin this business all of the time. Builders do it by touting their new and innovative voicing technique or some technical neck joint or otherdetail that they claim is unique to their guitars or building style. Alot of players get wrapped up in it a end up buying guitars for no other reason than that the builder made these claims. On the other hand, some builders obviously caught up in the whimsical claims of wood cutters too. If it heplps them seel product...more power to them, but we need to shop carefully and with our ears and eyes open all of the time.

    Free standing water in huge bodies like the major oceans of the world is one thing, but the water locked insde the minute and complexed pore structure of a standing tree is a completely different thing. There are times when the moisture content of any tree is lower or higher, I'm sure, but I doubt that it has much to do with the gravitational fields of the earth and moon reacting and interacting with one another. It's more likely caused by a system of factors like the amount of recent rainfall in the region and the condition of underground natural water tables and drainage movement that occurs around the roots of the trees and things of that sort.

   It was an intersting video, though. Claudio Pagelli is a true artists and some if his instruments are incredibly unique and inspiring. I would advise any luthier or player to dig around a little to get a look at some ofthem if they're able to.

   My opinion is that it is more chance than anything that can be accurately determined by moonphases.

Regards,
Kevin Gallagher/Omega Guitars

Moon phases! It's just **##****. Talk about snake oil.

As someone who in his job regularly takes a lot of microgravity readings to plot underground structures I can tell you that at the scale of a tree, the most sensitive measuring systems I know couldn't tell you where the moon was! The mountain the tree is standing causes a much greater gravitational effect.

Strewth, I hate all this new age pseudo-science, give me the numbers.

Colin

_________________
I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

the moon stuff was a little out there. but the video was great. Beautiful guitars.

The QT 7 thing was a real pain for me but I think it was worth the effort. I hope you profile lots more builders.

:-)

_________________
Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

There has been hype around my neck of the woods about "harvesting on a full moon". I used to work with federal fisheries and the same thing was said there, full moon, better catches. So we took some numbers, catches were no different. Trees have a very slow metabolism when they get larger enough to produce tonewood. I think that harvesting in late fall is best for me only because the tree is moving to it's more dormant phase for the winter and the weather is cooler so the blocks won't end check before I get a chance to re-saw them.

At the end of the day, good wood is good wood. No one, except he who fell the tree, will be able to say when tree hit the ground by looking at a finished top. On another note, don't fall trees at night, no matter how full the moon is, it is WAYYYYY too dangerous!

Shane

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Canada

I agree that the moonphase is BS, but I do believe there is a right time to cut a tree. I've been doing Bonsai for about 15 years, and do understand the cycles of trees. While the tree is dormant, sap is not moving through the tree, and most of the nutrients are coming from the food stored in the roots. Because of this, drying wood that was cut in the winter should dry more evenly across the grain. The Sap is not a factor any longer and less chance for pockets to form. Did you hear that piece of wood he was holding when he tapped it? It was like tapping a bell!
Tracy

Down in Mexico, cutting trees under the full moon is a euphemism for
doing your illegal logging when the authorities aren't going to see it.

_________________
Howard Klepper
http://www.klepperguitars.com

When all else fails, clean the shop.

[QUOTE=Howard Klepper] Down in Mexico, cutting trees under the full moon is a euphemism for
doing your illegal logging when the authorities aren't going to see it.[/QUOTE]

And now you have outed their secret.   

_________________
Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

[QUOTE=Howard Klepper] Down in Mexico, cutting trees under the full moon is a euphemism for
doing your illegal logging when the authorities aren't going to see it.[/QUOTE]

Not to mention Brazil...

_________________
"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

    I live in Pennsylvania. Logging is a pretty big industry here. The best time and this is only because of the equipment is winter as you can get into the wet areas as the gound is frozen.
    It really doesn't matter. I did ask my friend that logged and ran a sawmill for about 40years what he thought. He replied" there are 2 weeks in june when he liked to cut pine , because the powder post beatle won't infect them after they are cut "
     So with that info I don't think there is a special time. A tree is a tree and when it is a usable size it is time.
john hall

I only glue during a full moon.....that is why it takes me so long to build one guitar