IlPersiano
Oud Maniac
Posts: 62
Registered: 1-8-2016
Member Is Offline
|
|
Floating bridge wood: Padouk or Rosewood?
Dears all,
A few questions about floating bridge oud woods.
I have a floating bridge oud, Spruce top. As the bridge that comes with it is quite bad I wanna replace it with a new one, I was wondering if I shall
install one in Padouk or rather Rosewood?
If Rosewood, which best? Brasilian (harder) or Indian?
About mesurements. Which lenght and width would you suggest? I read in another related topic here on the forum, no less then 15cm lenght and anyway
50% or even 65% of the soundboard width. As for the bridge width about 4,5 cm. Would you agree with those?
Thank you so much in advance!
|
|
|
Omar Al-Mufti
Oud Junkie
Posts: 333
Registered: 3-14-2012
Member Is Offline
|
|
Well, I would follow violin luthiers experience. Use maple, dense enough to transfer sound waves, light enough not to affect the soundboard
vibration.
Cheers,
|
|
|
Jody Stecher
Oud Junkie
Posts: 1378
Registered: 11-5-2011
Location: California
Member Is Offline
|
|
Are you contemplating replacing the soundboard or the bowl or the entire oud?
Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano  | Dears all,
A few questions about floating bridge oud woods.
I have a floating bridge oud, Spruce top. I wanna replace that with a new one, I was wondering if I shall install one in Padouk or rather Rosewood?
If Rosewood, which best? Brasilian (harder) or Indian?
About mesurements. Which lenght and width would you suggest? I read in another related topic here on the forum, no less then 15cm lenght and anyway
50% or even 65% of the soundboard width. As for the bridge width about 4,5 cm. Would you agree with those?
Thank you so much in advance! |
|
|
|
IlPersiano
Oud Maniac
Posts: 62
Registered: 1-8-2016
Member Is Offline
|
|
| Quote: Originally posted by Jody Stecher | Are you contemplating replacing the soundboard or the bowl or the entire oud?
| Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano | Dears all,
A few questions about floating bridge oud woods.
I have a floating bridge oud, Spruce top. I wanna replace that with a new one, I was wondering if I shall install one in Padouk or rather Rosewood?
If Rosewood, which best? Brasilian (harder) or Indian?
About mesurements. Which lenght and width would you suggest? I read in another related topic here on the forum, no less then 15cm lenght and anyway
50% or even 65% of the soundboard width. As for the bridge width about 4,5 cm. Would you agree with those?
Thank you so much in advance! |
|
Hey Jody! Thank you for your reply. I realized actually one sentence was missing in my post and so my question sounded quite unclear - Now edited - I
wanna replace only the bridge 
|
|
|
IlPersiano
Oud Maniac
Posts: 62
Registered: 1-8-2016
Member Is Offline
|
|
| Quote: Originally posted by Omar Al-Mufti | Well, I would follow violin luthiers experience. Use maple, dense enough to transfer sound waves, light enough not to affect the soundboard
vibration.
Cheers, |
I personally wouldn't Omar. Im a double bass player myself as well, and I can tell that a bowed isntrument is different from a plucked. And beside
that, lutes, ouds or guitar top have much more stress compared to strings isntruments.
|
|
|
Jody Stecher
Oud Junkie
Posts: 1378
Registered: 11-5-2011
Location: California
Member Is Offline
|
|
Oh! now I understand. I think you will have equally pleasing results from rosewood or padauk. Ebony is good also. Padauk is not only lovely wood but
it behaves much like Brazilian rosewood and it is relatively abundant and bringing it across borders is not a legal issue. But Indian rosewood makes
very good bridges on all sorts of plucked instruments. (and oud bowls as well).
I think any of these are likely to produce good results.
| Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano | | Quote: Originally posted by Jody Stecher | Are you contemplating replacing the soundboard or the bowl or the entire oud?
| Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano | Dears all,
A few questions about floating bridge oud woods.
I have a floating bridge oud, Spruce top. I wanna replace that with a new one, I was wondering if I shall install one in Padouk or rather Rosewood?
If Rosewood, which best? Brasilian (harder) or Indian?
About mesurements. Which lenght and width would you suggest? I read in another related topic here on the forum, no less then 15cm lenght and anyway
50% or even 65% of the soundboard width. As for the bridge width about 4,5 cm. Would you agree with those?
Thank you so much in advance! |
|
Hey Jody! Thank you for your reply. I realized actually one sentence was missing in my post and so my question sounded quite unclear - Now edited - I
wanna replace only the bridge |
|
|
|
IlPersiano
Oud Maniac
Posts: 62
Registered: 1-8-2016
Member Is Offline
|
|
| Quote: Originally posted by Jody Stecher | Oh! now I understand. I think you will have equally pleasing results from rosewood or padauk. Ebony is good also. Padauk is not only lovely wood but
it behaves much like Brazilian rosewood and it is relatively abundant and bringing it across borders is not a legal issue. But Indian rosewood makes
very good bridges on all sorts of plucked instruments. (and oud bowls as well).
I think any of these are likely to produce good results.
| Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano | | Quote: Originally posted by Jody Stecher | Are you contemplating replacing the soundboard or the bowl or the entire oud?
| Quote: Originally posted by IlPersiano | Dears all,
A few questions about floating bridge oud woods.
I have a floating bridge oud, Spruce top. I wanna replace that with a new one, I was wondering if I shall install one in Padouk or rather Rosewood?
If Rosewood, which best? Brasilian (harder) or Indian?
About mesurements. Which lenght and width would you suggest? I read in another related topic here on the forum, no less then 15cm lenght and anyway
50% or even 65% of the soundboard width. As for the bridge width about 4,5 cm. Would you agree with those?
Thank you so much in advance! |
|
Hey Jody! Thank you for your reply. I realized actually one sentence was missing in my post and so my question sounded quite unclear - Now edited - I
wanna replace only the bridge |
|
Thank you Jody! It seems I may go more for Rosewood. And how about Indian Rosewood or Brasilian Rosewood?
Do you know perhaps how they would effect the sound each of them?
|
|
|
Jody Stecher
Oud Junkie
Posts: 1378
Registered: 11-5-2011
Location: California
Member Is Offline
|
|
The tone of a Brazilian rosewood bridge depends on the acoustics of the jail cell where it is being played. Just kidding. Although it is illegal to
bring Brazilian rosewood across the borders of many countries I know no one who has ever been stopped or had an instrument confiscated. Customs
officials are not wood experts. That said, not all pieces of Indian rosewood sound alike and the same goes for Brazilian. So it's hard to make a
blanket statement that will always be true. In my opinion the typical sound of padauk and the sound of Brazilian rosewood are similar. When you
strike a board of either one they make a similar "clang". Indian Rosewood tends to be a bit different. In general I have been happy with the sound of
Indian rosewood bridges on plucked instruments but fixed bridges and floating bridges are different from each other. I'm afraid my reply may not be
helpful at all!
|
|
|
SamirCanada
Moderator
Posts: 3405
Registered: 6-4-2004
Member Is Offline
|
|
I think like Jody said, they will all work wonderfully. As long as the wood is hard it should be a similar sound so just go with the one you like.
Whatever you do, don't use Brazilian rosewood. I think you will be very disappointed with the results. Just send it to me and I will dispose of it for
you.
@samiroud Instagram
samiroudmaker@gmail.com
|
|
|
Omar Al-Mufti
Oud Junkie
Posts: 333
Registered: 3-14-2012
Member Is Offline
|
|
IlPersiano,
On one of my floating bridge ouds I did lots of experimenting. Pelisander/rosewood was my less favourite.
I liked the results of maple and nut wood.
|
|
|
![[*]](images/xmbprobrown/default_icon.gif){kind=icon}
