Aiwass, you obviously don't know how much I do know about wood, or how much raw mahoghany, curly maple, cherry, poplar, walnut, etc has been in my hands, can one piece of wood sound vastly different from another, slightly is probably a better word, and anybody who believes they are getting the best sounding wood from any mass production manufacturer like Gibson, well, I have some magic guitar wood I'd like to sell you. When any company uses as much wood as Gibson etc, they use what is usable out of the order, they order by grade, dimension and qty, so much of what comes with that order is waste, what can be used, gets used, thats manufacturing, Gibson LP and Epi LP, Standards are mahoghany bodys with a maple top and a mahoghany neck with a rosewood fretboard, you are not going to find much difference in the wood, outside of the Gibson may have a little better figure in the flame tops, Electronically, they are the same, Gibson may use a little more expensive pots, but electricity doesn't really care, the resistance is what affects it, the pick-ups are 99% identical, Hardware the same, the Gibson is cosmetically probably a better guitar, it should be for that price, but cosmetics don't do much for sound, Here's something else that always has to come in to play when we talk about sound, the 3 major factors are Guitar, Amp and Player, Guitar players really like to focus on the guitar and amp, but the magic ingredient is the player. Here's a wood trivia question for all you sonic engineers, you are making one guitar, you have two pieces of wood to use, same size, cosmetically the same, same humidity content, which piece will you use and why?

[Edited by pstring on 01-25-2003 at 01:04 PM]