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Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 7:49 pm**

I'd like to start a thread specifically for the subject of the tone woods used to make conga's. That is, what are the various pro's and con's, plus the general sound that is produced from a conga made from any one of the following types of tone woods?

Walnut
Oak
Ash
Cedar
Mahogany
Bubinga
Koa
Mango
Cherry
Maple
Tweneboa
Mansonia
Iroko
Cocobolo

Please note, I am interested in the GENUINE versions of these woods, not the woods that carry the marketing name but are not actually the real thing (i.e. Siam Oak and rubberwood)

Also please note-- a few of these tone woods I know are used in high-end guitars (like cocobolo) and in african drums (like iroko and mansonia), but I have yet to hear of a conga made from that wood... yet, there could be some out there.

And, if you know of other quality tone woods in use, add them to the list please.

Input?

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 8:07 pm**

Oak is not actually a tonewood, but of course it's widely used in conga and bongo construction. So why is that? And it can sound pretty damn good - quarter-sawn oak Skin on Skins are some extremely fine drums. But oak is not used in guitars or other instruments that I know of - you don't even hear of oak drum set shells, either. I know early drums in Cuba and the Caribbean were made from the wood salvaged from old oak rum and wine barrels, as they could repurpose these existing staves more easily than making them from scratch, and they sounded pretty good even if the wood was not optimal, from a tonewood perspective.

But is there a good reason for oak nowadays besides good sound, tradition, strength, availability and price? Oops - these all sound like good reasons to me. Not that there aren't better woods.

But if oak is not a tonewood, why do/can oak congas sound so good?

~Taiko

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonewood

Edited By taikonoatama on 1181775707

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 8:16 pm**

Good question--

Maybe since it's not actually a "tone" wood, then perhaps it provides a good wood-block kind of sound in a drum????

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 8:29 pm**

Whopbamboom wrote:Maybe since it's not actually a "tone" wood, then perhaps it provides a good wood-block kind of sound in a drum????

Yeah, I was thinking something along these lines. Maybe having optimal resonance is not critical - it's not like you want a 5 second sustain on your open tones! That would just get in the way. So the less-than-optimal resonance might not be such a bad thing, and the other nuances of the wood/sound somehow work for a conga.

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 9:22 pm**

Are any of these woods prone to splitting? Cedar maybe?

And, has anyone ever heard of a conga being made from ebony wood? Seems like the slats could be obtained, since they use black ebony for guitar fretboards. But I'd imagine that would make for very expensive drums!!!

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 9:56 pm**

taikonoatama - that's exactly what I think.
My idea is: drums need completely different wood qualities than other instruments made of tonewood.
For example here in Czech Republic, most valued tonewood is spruce (Picea abies) - it must grow under special (almost rare) conditions (shade, canopy), be old enough (older than 120 years) and some more. Then it's really expensive and it's used for finest violins and pianos. But I never heard about a drum made of tonewood spruce.The reason IMHO is not final price but piano and violin, being string instrument need thin wooden desk with highest possible resonance constant to proloud the sound while for drums is density much more important.
Top quality tonewood spruce has density of about 470 kg.m-3 and oak is 630-720 kg.m-3
The same thing I reallized with african djembes - the more dense wood the better (it's littlebit simplified but works more or less).
What do you think?
It'd be nice to have acoustic physician here

Some time ago I wanted to measure acoustic qualities of different african woods and different shapes of djembes as my diploma work at university (I study forestry) - to be able to say what exactly causes good/bad sound. But then I left that idea because it could be to complicated with unsure results..

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 10:39 pm**

Yeah, for drums you don't really want resonance, you want
amplification.
With guitars usually you want amplification and sustain.

Posted: **Wed Jun 13, 2007 11:00 pm**

Alright, I can see those differences. So let's talk about various woods and how they measure up in the world of conga's or other drum shells, both in stave contsruction and in one-piece shells.

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 4:04 am**

Tonewoods description by wikipedia is in reference to guitars in general.
Guitars need to resonate: the body for the mids and lows, the neck for upper highs and highs.

The body is made of highly resonating material , not unlike violins. some use maple. I think strativarious (sp??) violins use a certian type of maple. to resonate.

Tumbadoras need to project along with resonate. more on the project method.

As far as oak, I do not know the true history, but IMO( and I speculate LOL):
In Cuba they had the cajon(hey that all they could get their hands on ) for yambu. The African trade brought over the "conga". Possibly the wine/whiskey etc type liquor used oak barrels. hmm, P.R. tumbadoras are short like a whiskey barrel no? Maybe thats where the staves came in??
**BBIIIGG CAVEAT disclaimer :I apologize if I am totally off base, however, my speculation is not intended in any way to belittle and or deface any history of our loved drums.

T

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 4:53 am**

A quick read of Nolan Warden's "History of the Conga Drum"
The stave drums were made because "African" drums were against the law..
the stave drums were'nt "African" cuz in Africa they did'nt use staves....
seems logical and Warden probably knows his stuff..

Edited By bongosnotbombs on 1181796874

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 5:52 pm**

DRUM! magazine had a series of articles that addressed various woods and their effect on snare drum sound. They tried to be scientific and keep all things equal except the wood used in the drum shell. Many of the woods you are curious about were documented.

The snare drum builder that did those articles has a website that lists wood sound characteristics. I can't remember the name, but if you google the subject it should come up.

As far as oak wood goes, there has been several snare drum models made from it by different makers. It is considered a good snare drum wood with unique bright loud character.

The most used wood for snare drums is maple, and is known for its volume, brightness, and resonance.

Maple is also the wood used in violins, along with spruce (as already mentioned). I too have wondered if spruce would make a good drum. It would be light weight.

I have seen softwoods like douglas fir and pine being used on homemade drums here in the Northwest United States. Very light weight and they have a mellow sound more like mahogany. I think Bauer out of Brazil makes a softwood cedar drum which has a mahogany quality to it also. Perhaps softwoods should be used more in drum manufacture.

One thing the articles in DRUM! stressed is the hardness of the wood and density. Generally the harder denser the wood, the more volume, sustain, and echo. Softer woods seem to absorb the sound, attenuating the tones.

Edited By bongo on 1181843741

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 7:14 pm**

I don't get the feeling that fir or pine would be good choices. I always see that wood with warps and splits anytime I go to the home improvement store.

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 7:48 pm**

Pine would be too soft, what does it sound like when you hit
2 2x4's together? pretty dull, hit two hard wood pieces together like whats used for claves....POW!

Kind of anecdotal, I know!

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 8:09 pm**

If DENSITY is king, then it should be fairly easy to find dense woods via the internet. Here are a couple sites that list actual densities:

http://www.worldagroforestrycentre.org/sea/Products/AFDbases/WD/

http://www.woodweb.com/Resources/wood_eng_handbook/Ch01.pdf

Some of these woods are very beautiful! This page has pictures of a few of them:

http://www.hardwoodgallery.com/woods.htm

Here is a page with an explanation of "quartersawn" vs. "backsawn", and other grain-related stuff:

http://www.auf.asn.au/scratchbuilder/timber.html

It is surprising to find that some of the commonly used conga woods are NOT the densist woods. There are some really dense woods out there! But then again, perhaps some of the other really dense woods have their own set of problems, such as cracking/warping, difficult to machine (saw), difficult to obtain in large enough sizes (or anything at all), difficult to glue staves, expense, etc.

But, perhaps with some research, maybe an obscure wood could turn out to be perfect for that custom-made conga set!

Edited By Whopbamboom on 1181852086

Posted: **Thu Jun 14, 2007 8:18 pm**

The fact that mahogany, a light and not particularly hard wood (though quite durable), is widely acknowledged as one of the finest woods for congas tells us that there are wood characteristics beyond density and hardness that are important for sound. I'm not expert enough to know what they are, exactly, but this much seems clear.

~Taiko

Edited By taikonoatama on 1181863450

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