14 replies to this topic

[Wm. Johnston]

This is another video from Taylor guitars that I found a while back. This one has tonewood cutters in the rainforests of Alaska cutting Sitka spruce billets from a tree that fell down. I have a decent sized stash of Sitka spruce (cut in this same region but by a different cutter) so I thought it was interesting to see how the wood was handled in the field.



Hmm, the embedded video doesn't play correctly for me, you might need to copy the URL and paste it into a fresh window.

[Conor Russell]

Well worth seeing! many thanks.

Conor

[JSully]

This is super interesting, thanks for posting.

[David Burgess]

Thanks for linking the video, Johnston.

My impression, with the video coming from a commercial guitar manufacturing company, is that they might be laying it on a little thick.
Are they trying to suggest that all their instruments are made from trees which have died already from "natural causes"? Are they trying to suggest that moving the wood out by helicopter adds to value (and novelty)?

What would things look like if we could actually find out where most of their wood comes from?

[captainhook]

I agree with David. Looks to me like it would make a lot more sense to lift log sections out and work them up under much more convenient/efficient circumstances.

[welshman]

David,
a few points from one with a forestry degree or two

tone wood is a specialty harvest so a windfall of old growth logs harvested as a salvage operation would be a "windfall" of opportunity, low cost for the logs, no cost for felling the tree just cost for bucking them into workable sections and only doing that for the best sections of the tree.

working the trees in site means leaving the waste in the woods, no cost to bring what you don't want out to the landing

the helicopter was pretty small so lifting load is small, it couldn't have lifted the whole log if it tried

the steep hill side and height near the summit would preclude using anything other that a helicopter or a rig line to get the tree out but this was a very selective harvest that would boast little site damage to the rest of the trees and soil, big plus actually, in the south wood cutters still use animal teams when possible to avoid site damage

splitting the blanks in the field makes sense to keep transportation costs down as well as only taking what they can use, also might lessen the risk of ring shake (separation) by using the windfalls and also not subjecting the wood to rough handling in transport.

I admired the worker's skill in using the froe and wedges as well as his trimming of the knot wood, he is highly skilled.

Reese

[Wm. Johnston]

Thanks for linking the video, Johnston.

My impression, with the video coming from a commercial guitar manufacturing company, is that they might be laying it on a little thick.
Are they trying to suggest that all their instruments are made from trees which have died already from "natural causes"? Are they trying to suggest that moving the wood out by helicopter adds to value (and novelty)?

What would things look like if we could actually find out where most of their wood comes from?

Actually, the two times that I watched this video I fast forwarded through the sales pitch and just went straight to the wood cutting, so I never gave it much thought. The supplier that I get my sitka from, http://www.alaskawoods.com , also claims to get some of his wood from fallen trees so I don't think this is an unusual practice in Southeast Alaska.

The forest is a big place. I've wandered around a small area of a spruce forest in my region of the country, not Alaska. I know of the locations of enough fallen old growth Englemann spruce trees to keep many violin makers busy for the rest of their lives. Englemann spruce are like matchsticks compared to these Sitka spruce trees.

Given how much wood is used (even by a relative giant like Taylor) I don't think it's impossible to get all of the wood needed from fallen trees but it would be a lot easier and predictable to just go and pick out logs that had been clear cut. So yes I agree that I find it unlikely that Taylor gets all of their spruce from fallen trees, but at the same time the guys in the video might be in the woods all the time cutting billets. And the helicopter, I'd have been more surprised to see a truck in the video than the helicopter. It's hard to justify cutting a road into a remote patch of forest in order to haul out pieces of one tree.

[David Burgess]

Didn't Taylor make about 500 guitars per day in 2010? About 110,000 per year?

I'm still questioning whether this is representative or typical of the way they obtain their wood. Probably a lot cheaper to buy and saw up commercially harvested logs. Not nearly as romantic though.

[bmccarthy]

That's a hell of a lot of guitars, no wonder he controlls the last of the worlds ebony

[Wm. Johnston]

As with David B. doubting that Taylor uses fallen trees for all their guitar tops (I doubt it too but don't think it's impossible) I doubt that they control the world's supply of ebony. Now if you restrict yourself to ebony from Cameroon then yes they probably control over 75% of that market. I didn't watch the ebony video carefully enough to catch all of the qualifications when he was talking about Cameroon being the last place you can get ebony but I would suspect there to be a lot of them. Is it the last place to find old growth ebony, ebony of a certain diameter, species, price, quality ,,,? I suspect that if you looked at all types, trunk sizes, and growing regions that Taylor doesn't control the ebony market. If Cameroon was the last place to get ebony then I also don't see why all of the cheap ebony fittings are made in India. All that said, ebony supplies aren't what they used to be and if there is a violinmaking wood to be looking to replace it is ebony.

[welshman]

Well, all of their spruce from fallen trees might be a stretch - I didn't see that in the video or about ebony, is there another?

More than likely the cutter is an independent contractor, one of many, searching the woods for the right log, fallen or not, harvesting the wood would take a lot of time and effort but if their are lots of them then the supply would be steady.
Reese

[Michael_Molnar]

The video is informative and fun. The issue is which sections of that tree do I get? There is some garbage in that tree not worth the helicopter trip. For that reason, you should inspect what you are sold.

I am curious: How many of the above respondents actually harvest their own trees? I don't, but rely on a few qualified people who are BIG in the business. Nevertheless, I examine what they sell to me. After all, they are business people.

... .

Mike

[lyndon]

the tennesse red spruce supplier i used to buy from, ted davis is unfortunately deceased, however he had permits to go out in a forest, ring the bark at the right time of year to cut off the sap, wait several months, then cut the tree at the right time of year, then cut the log to length and split into wedges with an ax, then he told me he had to back pack it out to his pickup, then 7-10 years of air drying, but for clavichords at least it was the best wood i ever tried, and of similar density and strength to strong picea abies european spruce

ted used the traditional wood cutting methods used in europe, using felled trees sounds like a good idea, but if the tree fells at the wrong time of year it can actually have much more sap than teds method for living trees

when i did a google search to look for similar quality tenn red, i came up with nothing except bruce harvey (orcas island tone woods?) had some billets bought from a retired maker, the big suppliers of tenn red all seem to be kiln drying the wood

is anyone suggesting maestronetters learn to pilot helicopters????

[Ernie Martel]

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[Julian Cossmann Cooke]

Thanks for posting this, Bill. I have several well-aged Sitka quarters that I bought from another maker so it is fun to have this context. Even if it stretches the credulity in places .