WENGE - the MOST UNDERRATED acoustic guitar tonewood?! - Millettia laurentii - Tommy's Tonewoods
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Published 2021-02-09
It often gets a raw deal in the aesthetics department and considered pretty bland to look at when quartersawn BUT when crown cut or 'flatsawn' the true character of this wood is revealed, the biggest win is that it remains stable in this grain orientation!
All Comments (21)
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Awesome! Love that wood and its tone.
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I have a parlour guitar made with a red spruce top and wenge back and sides. It’s truly a little power house! Never expected to have so much power from a small bodied guitar. It’s one of my favourite recording tools!
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Wow! I can hear it without headphones. Amazing. Tony recommend that I give you a watch and a listen. Glad he did. I enjoyed the video.
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Great video!
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Since I saw the Schecter Nick Johnston signature with a wenge neck I became obsessed with wenge necks!
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Tom, I always enjoy your content. I especially love Tommy's Tonewoods I think it would be great if you post a lot of videos about Tonewoods in the future And can you let me know your opinion if cedar and WENGE will match?
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The nicest sounding tenor ukulele I ever came across was Wenge back and sides with a Western red cedar top. I use it quite a bit too. Fretboards and binding, especially when cut slightly off the quarter. Hopefully, as with all these woods, they are replanting.
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It is the straight, clean, no defect grain pattern that is appealing. Purple heart is another example of wood that can still be found that is perfectly straight and clean. Used to be that the perfectly straight grained quarter sawn wood was the most desirable. But the changing times goes to show that wood can be flat sawn or even rift sawn and still make a guitar that will stay together if worked properly.
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I just made a Martin style Om with that wood and it sounds amazing, it project like crazy paired with an European spruce it works very well
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Beautiful tonewood
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I've built a few electrics with Wenge fingerboards. It's look is very dependent on the cut, get it right and there's a lovely brick red to black figure that's gorgeous when it has a finish on it. Very open pores, I find a filler matched to the darker tones works best to maintain that contrast. My next project will be a cyano fretless bass using it, should be interesting as I've had great success with the cyano process.
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Thanks for the informative video! I read on the wood database that Wenge is not recommended for laminating. Is this so? I was thinking of using it as one of the stringers in a through neck electric guitar, does it come unlamented?
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Thanks for the info about 'wenge wood'. I believe I have a little wenge laying around which should be enough for building a few guitars. Most is quater sawn or neerly quarter sawn. It came from a 'gym bouncy box' that I trained on as a child. So, must be 60 years old. The question however is, would it be useful for guitar sides? It seems it is very difficult to bend. Any advice I would greatly appreciate. Chris
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I've been interested in Wenge for a while. Way back in the 60s, my best friend had an old D-28 (not sure what year, probably from the 50s) - it had the most boring grain pattern - simple and straight - but it sounded awesome! I'll taking boring looks if it sounds good!
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The grain pattern reminds me lot of a random pattern Damascus steel. Very cool!
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I am wondering how it might work on the Top, yes I know it may not turn out great but it could be interesting.
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I have a set of wenge... I’m saving it until my skills improve. The thought of bending it terrifies me. Also looks like edge sharpness on tools will be critical. Amazing tap tones though.
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Marimba tackle. I’d never heard of the stuff until seeing a video of Rory Dowling using the stuff for necks. That pink border is sexy as hell alongside this stuff.
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I have a solid shell djembe drum made from 12kg of wenge(lenke). It seems pretty quiet (for a djembe), but, when I played it with 4-5 other drummers you could hear it singing louder than any other. It's probably not just beacause of the wood, but I love the tone, dark and not a hint of same muddy darkness as mahagony. The tone is quite snappy and coherent.
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You can make wenge look more interesting by applying bleach to it. The bleach doesn't affect the colour of the darker grain but soaks into the lighter grain and turns it almost white which provides a nice contrast with the dark grain. I have absolutely no idea whatsoever how this would affect the wood's tonal properties but it would be interesting to find out 🤔.
