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With regard to guitars, “old growth” seems like a marketing term. In my experience, SCGC doesn’t pepper their scant advertising with these terms. However, they exist in a market where other companies do, so they need to know how to use the terms.
Old growth is what people who work with and in forests call a forest/grove/copse that has not been logged out before. There are groves of old growth redwoods in California and Oregon (some very close to the SCGC workshop). It is supposed to apply to trees, not to their wood. This is in contrast to ‘second growth’, a forest/grove/copse that has arisen where the original trees have been logged out. Usually the types of trees change in second growth.
[In Pennsylvania, we had millions of acres of white pines that were logged out between 1880 and 1920. The trees that replaced the white pine (the second growth) are and were chestnuts, oaks, birches, cherry, maple, etc – deciduous trees that survive more easily as individuals rather than evergreens, which do better in groups.
[If you’re in the wilds of northern PA looking at a mountainside in the fall, you’ll see a million shades od red, gold, yellow, brown, and orange with a single giant pine standing up above the colors every few miles. Imagine the mountainside covered in those pines. That was the old growth.]
So… Old Growth wood in a guitar must mean that it is wood that was logged out from a forest that had not been logged before. I’m not sure that’s a good thing. And it makes zero difference to the sound because the quality of the wood -for the purpose of building a guitar- is not determined neither by the date at which the tree was cut and sawn nor the neighboring trees to the one that the wood from your guitar came from.
Marketing term. Play what you like, try to buy guitars from companies that do their best to be responsible about their wood sources, like SCGC. It’ll help keep wood guitars a thing for a lot longer.
Daniel
How much time do you have? 🙂
I joined the forum while a guy neamed Doug Jones (AKA Little Brother) was running it. He built it using a free database software package that he tweaked rather heavily in order to make it look like a custom job.
I think he as hoping to eventually get paid by SCGC for the effort, but it never materialised. At some point after 2004 and before 2010 he asked for a voulnteer to moderate, so I did. We had a couple of conversations, and he took me on.
Then about a year later (please forgive my lack of precise dating, I didn’t take notes at the time) he dropped the whole thing in my lap. I did my best to learn the software he used, but his modifications made updating the damn thing nightmarish, and at some point he stopped answering my questions.
So it limped on for a few more years. Then I got married, moved to the UK, and had a baby.
It was at this point (I may have even been working full time by then) that the thing went down, and nothing I could do would bring it back. Every forray into the back end of the thing seemed more confusing than the last, and it only got worse.
Lacking both the time and the deep expertise required to save the forum database, I had to throw in the towel.
In short, I was a good moderator and a lousy sys admin.
I am happy that you guys have found the juice to retart things and carry on. And I stick around a) because I like SGCG guitars, b) because you’re all lovely people, and c) because I feel the need to atone for my failures. 😉
Daniel
I’d be interested in RH’s take as well.
I have an octave mandolin, built by Paul Hathway of England, with a zero fret. The zero fret on my OM allows fretted notes and “unfretted” notes to have the same timbre.
Also zero frets are a little easier to locate correctly than the front edge of the nut. So they can be an easy way to acheive accurate intonation.
And, of course, when you have a zero fret it sets the fret height. So the height of the slots in the nut is not as crucial.
Daniel
I have –on stage– forgotten whether I am playing a mandolin or a mandola and inadvertantly caught a C# when playing in the key of C. It prompted a quick instrument change after a very unhappy glare from the boss.
I feel your pain, Matt. And that is one reason I have not really felt internested in the H-13. 🙂
Daniel
I was so busy on Thursday that I didn’t have time to speak to my family!
I hope you all had a good one.
The city of Laon has been gently installing the Christmas dec.s on lightpoles since October. Last night they turned them all on. That’s how much Thanksgiving and ‘black Friday’ have affected our Christmas calendar here in France.
But it has been so dark dreary lately I didn’t mind.Play your guitars in good health!
Daniel
Sounds like you’re going to have a great guitar.
Welcome to the forum!
Can’t wait for photos of the completed guitar. 😉
Daniel
