Carbon Fibre Rods

[Bmth Builder]

Hey guys,

Been looking in to alternatives to importing Stew Macs CF bars, the only thing I can find in this country is rods though, but there doesnt seem to be a set price, or much description of quality or branding,

how much difference will there be in quality between these different sellers?

£6.50 per meter

£6.50 per meter

£5.66 per meter (the only people to mention a brand name)

£6.95 per meter

(non of the above include shipping)

Then the much cheaper china stuff of ebay...

About £5 per meter even after shipping

There are plenty more but you get the idea

I'm thinking the best one to go with is online kites and their 'exel' carbon fibre as thats the only one with a brand name, and so hopefully the best quality CF rods (exel seems to be a market leader in composites, turning over like 100 million a year).

Or should I just order from SM?

Edited May 25, 2010 by Neil Beith

[Buter]

Try East Coast Fibreglass

Any company you buy from that is not strictly a composite company would have purchased rods in bulk from a company like ecf, marked up the price and sold it on to you. No need to pay the middle man, really.

Cheers

Buter

Just looked at your links - can't really see anything wrong with them

[Bmth Builder]

Cheers for the link, they dont seem to do the rods though, only tubes.

[Buter]

IMHO tubes would be preferable.

Cheers

B

[Bmth Builder]

How come?

According to this thread, rods are stiffer than tubes...

http://projectguitar.ibforums.com/index.ph...c=42614&hl=

[Buter]

You're right, rods are slightly stiffer than tubes, but, again IMHO, not enough to make any real difference. A tube is a very stiff structure and, when applied correctly, nearly as strong as a solid rod of the same material.

One of the down sides to carbon/carbon fibre is that it is relatively heavy. The reason people tend to associate carbon/carbon fibre with lightweight products is that it is so stiff that little of it is needed to make a specific part or product. If you can use half the carbon of a rod to make a tube and still end up with nearly the same stiffness, that's the winner in my book.

If Erik's math is correct in that thread you reference, the carbon tubes are still 3x as stiff as the equivelant mass/volume of maple. How much stiffer do you really want your neck? If you were making a skinny neck, 36" bass yeah, maybe you wanna get some square bar to reinforce your neck. For a thick neck, 24.5 scale 21 fret single cut any carbon reinforcement would be overkill (having said that, Wez claims that the carbon bars eliminate 'dead spots' on a guitars neck).

I've got a neck trhough double cut out in the workshop that has three layers of carbon fibre running down the middle of the neck (mahog/cf/maple/cf/maple/cf/mahog) and I can tell you that it's as stiff as a sailor in a stip club. I am avoiding working on it due to the fact that it is killing my tools (as I suspected would happen and even state in the thread that you reference). I'll probably post a pic of it when I get around to finishing it (but I'll be finishing every other project I have first!!).

All the above just my opinion and I'm always happy to be proven wrong, just ask my wife.

Cheers

Buter

[erikbojerik]

Yes my math is correct.

One calculation I did after that post, was to compare the different bars-rods-tubes by mass - CF composites are more dense (heavy) than an equivalent volume of any wood, even ebony. So replacing a given volume of maple with the same volume of CF will always make the neck a little more heavy (though not as heavy as a Warmoth which uses steel bars).

Turns out that using CF tubes will improve the stiffness of the neck with almost no change in mass, because of the air volume inside the tube.

[Doeringer]

Butler LOL

I have used the tubes for years and have been very happy with the results!