Neck Blank: Warmoth Or Stewmac?

[kench]

Hello everyone

I am living in Istanbul, Turkey. I had built a LP guitar back in 2005 using woods from local timber shops (sapele body and neck). The guitar turned out great (even better than some Gibson I handed).

Now I want to build a custom bolt-on guitar. Finding tone woods in Turkey is not a problem, but it is hard to find hard rock maple for the neck. Because there are lots of maple here but the sellers don't usually deal with luthiers, and they don't know much about woods they supply. I don't want to end-up with a soft maple, so I will probably buy a neck blank from US. You guys probably have your own favorite wood supplier over there, but I believe StewMac and Warmoth are the only ones who send worldwide.

Probably there is no scientific or certain answer to this question, but which of the two are better quality? I'm sure there are people here who used them both on their guitars.

StewMac blank:

27" x 4" x 0,8125"

20.50 USD

Warmoth Blank:

27" x 4" x 0,75"

15.00 USD

If there are better sellers who deals worldwide, I would like to know them too.

Thank you.

[killemall8]

Honestly,

Soft maple (the species) Is a perfectly good wood.

[guitar2005]

I've used "Soft" maple (Silver Leaf) and also Birch. Both will make very good necks.

[pauliemc]

Like the boys said, You dont really need rock maple. Some of the best looking & playing necks I have ever made were with flat sawn soft maple species. its plenty strong.

[bob123]

Food for thought. Mahogany is a VERY common neck wood. Has a janka hardness of around 800. "Soft" maple has a hardness of 8-900 depending on species, but similar in strength to mahogany. What I would say, stay away from super figured soft maple for necks though, as figuring weakens wood, and the more figure, the weaker it gets. This is ESPECIALLY true with birdseye figuring.

[Workingman]

Almost all of the violin family uses "soft" maple. This includes the upright bass which is under a lot more tension than a guitar. I would rather buy a piece of wood that I can look at than mail order any day.

[kench]

Warmoth asks $60.00 for just shipping anyway. So I decided to get the woods locally.

[bob123]

Any particular reason you are gunning for maple? Your location is pretty prime for european, african, and asian hardwoods! Balau, Wenge, A neck made of iroko would be astounding haha.