Pete,
That is going to be another great looking guitar, the ray and fleck effect across the back plates should look great under a finish.
Sometimes I lament the fact that Australia is quite short of dark coloured timbers that grow large enough to be resawn for two piece backs. But when you see the figure produced by some of these lighter coloured woods, it is difficult not to accept that we have been dealt a more than fair hand for our choice in wood bling, especially when you consider that dark coloured wood cannot refract light so well, so even when heavily figured, a lot of its visual impact is lost.
On the topic of aussie tonewood, it seems to me that when compared to forest conditions on a global scale, even our better regions have quite poor soils and limited, or less than regular rain fall. This would explain the slow growth of many of the species in this country. I imagine that in general terms, when considering how wood is formed, the 'number' of wood cells produced each season probably remains much the same within tree types no matter where they are grown. (By tree types I am suggesting those groups of plants which produce a similar 'wood structure' when grown under the same conditions rather than those grouped into species by leaf, flower and reproduction form as is the norm)
I speculate that what we see happen with the slower growth within tree types when conditions become less than ideal, is that 'smaller' more compact cells are produced rather than less cells, and these small compact cells are a mechanism of adaptation which assist in moisture and nutrient retention allowing these plant to survive where they probably should not. This probably explains why we have such an abundance of quite heavy, dense, and truly 'hard' woods in this country, and although it was a long way to get there, and delivery came with a few shovel fulls of unscientific speculation, I am suggesting that those properties do seem just the ticket to produce buckets loads of the 'boing' factor that makes many of these Australian natives very good tonewoods indeed.
Cheers
Kim
