Give me your opinions

[sscovill]

Alright, here's the deal. I'm going to attempt to make a Les Paul. Unfortuantley, I'm not able to make the beautiful carved top that is a signature look for the LP.

So, to compensate, I'm trying to decide if it would look cooler to stain a piece of flame or quilted maple to use as the front and back of the guitar.

Since this is my first from-scratch build, I'd love to hear opinions and suggestions from you guys. I'm thinking of staining it with an ebony stain and lightly sanding it afterwards to get some good defintion of color in the wood grain.

Anyway, enough from me. Let me hear your thoughts!

Thanks,

Steve

[guitarchump]

well use what wood you think looks better as a top. If you are not carving it you could always use venners and save some money.

[sscovill]

I don't think I'd want to stain over a veneer. I think I'd get better results going with a maple overlay, wouldn't I?

Ideally, I'd like to have it look like a black & lighter black "stripe" or other kind of pattern from the stain.

[camcool]

I like goncalo alves top and back

try a pau ferro fretboard

[Drak]

I like goncalo alves top and back

try a pau ferro fretboard

Really? Maybe you'd like to share with the group your experiences, good and bad, with Goncalo Alves and Pau Ferro.

Were they easy to 'work'?

Hard or easy on your tools and bits?

So how do they sound?

[Jivin]

^ lol

I vote for quilted maple.... imo nothing beats a quilt so deep it looks like you could swim in it

[skibum5545]

Of the two, I'd go flame. Quilt looks really good as a carved top, but on a flat top flame looks great. Get one of Brian's veneers from universaljems.com; cheap and good lookin'!