fretboard

[JK]

i'm not sure this is the right category for this question, i'll be glad to move it if i should. i put it here because my question is caused by changing my mind on how i'm going to finish the guitar.

i'm planning on building a swamp ash strat. i will be giving it to my son who had his lp studio ripped off (no insurance!). i keep him informed as to what i'm planning - pup, bridge, etc, but he doesn't know he's getting it. i showed him the swamp ash body picture on the warmoth site and he said he thought it would look great with wood stain - i had planned a translucent color stain. i got to thinking that if i did a wood stain i probably wouldn't have a black neck as planned. if i didn't have a black neck, i might want to reconsider the ebony fingerboard.

here's what i would like to know (finally, sorry). since a maple neck and swamp ash body are both pretty bright, would a warmer fretboard wood help balance the tone? is it a good idea?

if i use a warmer wood i'm thinking either brazilian rosewood, indian rosewood, kingwood or ziricote. i could experiment and get my stain to match or probabaly complement the shade of the fretboard.

any comments on these woods and whether or not to go with the warmer wood will be appreciated. i feel like i'm starting over!
       

 

[Tonar8352]

I love a Swamp Ash body/Maple neck combination.  Again I am a vintage fan so that influences my choices.  That said; I built a Swamp Tele with an 5A Flame Maple/Brazilian board neck and a Swamp Strat with a 5A Flame/Ziricote neck and I found them to be to muddy for me.  I switched  the strat to a vintage modern 1 piece Birdseye maple and it sounded way better.  I sold the Ziricote neck to a friend to use on his Fender Basswood body and it sounded good.  The Tele neck will go when I find the right person to sell it to and will be replace with maple.

To me swamp likes the ping and sparkle of a maple neck.

 

[simple]

Going for a balanced tone, and the fact that you're coming from an LP type guitar, I would go with the Indian rosewood. The other woods are denser, thus brighter.

 

[JK]

that makes a lot of sense. i know he liked the rosewood on his gibson. thanks

 

[jackthehack]

What kind of music does your son play? If he's into metal and his set up includes a lot of effects, the differentiation between choice of neck/fretboard wood might be negligible. If he's more used to the LP, he might be more comfortable with a rosewood fretboard. Haven't used a ziricote, but from past experience have not noticed a lot of difference between Brazilian or Indian Rosewood or Kingwood tonally, the Kingwood may be a hair brighter, Kingwood has a completely different appearance and can set a guitar apart from the pack....

 

[JK]

he mostly plays blues (bbk style as opposed to srv), classic/souther rock and some funk. he plays mostly clean and sometimes uses a pedal. i know he wants a fast fretboard. is kingwood fast? it does look interesting.

 

[simple]

is kingwood fast? it does look interesting.

Yes. It's very smooth and dense. It's really nice stuff  :icon_thumright:

 

[JK]

is kingwood as fast as rosewood? jackthehack said it was a hair brighter so i assume it would offset the brightness of the guitar nearly as well as indian rosewood, right?

 

[ozan]

I can prefer you brazilian rosewood as fingerboard. A swamp ash strat with maple/brazilian rosewood neck is absolutly suitable for playin blues and cathing SRV's tone (maybe two or three steps closer to his guitar tone) . This combination is a the most traditional and reliable way to have a bright blues tone.

Sorry but I couldn't understand the "fast fingerboard" thing. Does it mean easier and faster to play? If you can play it you can play on every neck am I wrong?

By the way you can take more attantion by opening this topic in "neck woods" part.

 

[-CB-]

Oh... I'm probably not in the mainstream here, but...

I cant help but think swamp ash and mahogany are a good combo, and... on that.. either dark rosewood or ebony.

Hey, on that "stain"... swamp ash does not really stain all that well.  Its ok, but can be a little blotchy... you might want to try a translucent finish instead.

 

[JK]

thanks to all for the helpful hints and your thoughts.