The point is really one of application. The shank is under a completely different kind of use and subjected to stress types that simply make a brittle shank useless. It will snap under use. An old spruce panel just as brittle may be a pain in the ass to wood work into a solid functioning soundboard assembly... but once thats accomplished it can be brittle as all heck I would suppose. The ribs of such an assembly are taking the stresses involved. Actually.. such a soundboard would probably have one advantage in that most of its reaction to climatic change has disappeared from its list of characteristics. Old (aged) spruce has documented differing acoustic properties then new spruce.. partially because of its increased brittleness. Whether or not those different acoustic properties can be construed to be equivalent to <<superior tonal qualities>> is a subjective matter in my book. Either you prefer the sound or you dont. Some like em hot.. and some like em cold.. no sense trying to define the world for everyone besides yourself me thinks. Cheers RicB Ed writes: Then compare the flat-top Martin guitar of 1945 with a new one. It is a solid spruce panel, butt-jointed across a set of ribs, subjected to compression and tension. There is nothing in the older spruce that demonstrates deterioration. In fact, it seems, and the market among the real experts supports, that the older wood has superior tonal qualities that the new wood does not Ed 440:
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