Do you know how the wood used to make the violin is sawed?

    If you want to make a violin with beautiful appearance and pleasant sound, not only the luthier must have superb craftsmanship, but the selection of wood is also the top priority. And do you know how the wood used to make the violin is sawed?（ The full text is 866 words, and it takes about 5 minutes to read.）

    The sawing method of the wood has a great influence on the grain of the wood, so when making a violin and selecting wood, there are usually clear requirements for the sawing method of the wood.At present, wood sawing methods are usually divided into three types: flat sawn, quarter sawn and ture quartersawn.

    Flat sawn(plainsawn): that is cutting along the main axis of the trunk or the direction of the wood grain, perpendicular to the radius of the trunk section. Advantages: Easiest operation east waste and most cost-effective. The width of the sawn board will have beautiful wood grains such as large patterns and landscape texture, so there are many solid wood flat-sawn boards on the market. Disadvantages: easy to deform, relatively large shrinkage and expansion, prone to curling or twisting, need to pay attention when processing.

    Quarter sawn(rift sawn): The wood pile is divided into four parts and then sawing. The part far from the heartwood is called the quarter sawn  board. The quarter sawn board is mostly straight grain and stable in nature. The angle between the section and the annual ring is 30-60 degrees.

    Ture quartersawn: cutting the wood into four equal parts, and then sawing each part, these planks that are close to the heartwood are called ture quartersawn planks.The angle between the annual ring and the layout is generally 60-90 degrees,and the resulting wood has a straight texture,  often with a beautiful tabby wood grain.Advantages: The stability is the strongest, and the deformation is the smallest among the three cutting methods. Disadvantages: Time-consuming consumables are the highest among the three cutting methods, so they are also the most expensive.

    In the 17th century, due to the pursuit of exquisite violins by the nobles at that time, both the top and the back of the violin were sawed by the method of string cutting, and the later top plate were no longer used.Generally speaking, the current violin sawing method is as follows: the top plate is cut in flat sawn, and the back plate is cut in various ways.

    Quarter sawn wood is harder and stronger than flat sawn wood, does not warp during drying, and is said to be more than double the pressure resistance than flat sawn wood.Especially the panel made of real quarter sawn wood, its annual rings can be made perpendicular to the bottom plate or radian of the violin board, which has high pressure resistance, and the radian is not easily deformed by the pressure of the strings, and the plate can be made thinner and more elastic. The vibration amplitude is large, and the pith beam pattern perpendicular to the annual ring can be seen, which increases the appearance of the plate.

    The back plate wood of the violin is usually maple. Since maple has many uses, different sawing methods are used to obtain wood that meets the requirements.The flat sawn maple plate has a special and beautiful pattern, and the pattern can be symmetrically arranged to increase the beauty.Therefore, the back plate is made of flat sawn wood.In addition, the back plate of the double bass requires a large area of plate, generally using a flat sawn plate, and when it is not wide enough, several plates are used together.If the wood is slowly turned, the light and shade of the pattern will change due to the change of the incident and reflection angles of the light, and the color of the painted violin surface will also change.

    In addition, when sawing wood, the choice of splitting or sawing is also a very important criterion for selecting wood.Especially in the selection of violin top wood, split wood is often better.Because the growth direction of wood fibers is consistent with the direction of tree height, the wood will split along the direction of the fibers at the split.The fibers of the wood are parallel to the split surface, and there will be no broken fibers.Moreover, the wood fibers of the sounding board made are parallel to the bottom surface of the violin board.If the wood is sawn,it is difficult to ensure that the sawed surface is consistent with the natural direction of wood fibers. The fiber direction intersects with the cut surface at an angle, and many fibers will be cut off.Therefore, the radially split spruce material is used for the top plate, and the resonance is better.However, the utilization rate of split wood is only 33%, while that of sawn wood can reach 74%.So split lumber is rare and more expensive than sawn lumber.Spruce is easier to split, because the straight wood fibers can ensure the straightness when splitting, and there are fewer branches and knots, so split wood is often used as the top plate.

    Finally,for a violin maker like Fiddlover,take it very seriously when buying wood.After all, the right wood is the beginning of a good violin.