Try a cello too that way it can remain planted. As you play.
2 days ago
| 509
All I can say is that this would take a LOT of patience and time to do and you’d probably want several versions all growing at the same time in case of failures and we probably wouldn’t see a conclusion for years no matter how you do it (unless of course some genius arborist wants to prove me wrong and give us this awesome video sooner)
2 days ago | 419
A few ideas: 1. Maclura pomifera (Osage orange) is a fast grower, and while its not nearly as fast as willow, it has probably the densest/strongest wood per growth rate of any tree, and was used as bow wood for indigenous people in its native range. If it can withstand a bowstring it could absolutely withstand at least nylon or electric guitar strings. It is also at least trainable enough to form hedgerows, and I bet you could get it to work. 2. Train a vine around a frame. This is not quite as cool bc the frame is going to give you the structure, but it has its benefits. It'd be a lot easier to train a specific shape, and you could do something with multiple vines or even start with root stock of an existing vine (just pull up a big chunk of invasive bittersweet root and you'll have rapid shoots.) 3. Other options that are similarly fast/not as strong but possibly stronger than willow: mulberry, princess tree, or any type of fast-growing shrub that's fire or heavy-browse adapted. All of these grow rapidly and are used to being pruned/resprouting like willow, making it possible to train them. Edit: I would strongly recommend not starting from seed, especially not when you're experimenting. No tree is going to be dense enough to form branches that can hold guitar strings for at least like 7-10 years for fast growers. You're going to want to start with root stock. If you can't find root stock of what you want for sale, find someone with one of these on their property who will let you take a big chunk of root out (these are all "weedy" species, so theres a good chance someone wouldn't mind having one removed) or choose an invasive species and discreetly dig it up somewhere where nobody will care.
2 days ago (edited) | 216
Bro you always have the most batshit insane ideas and somehow the willpower to actually execute them, respect
2 days ago | 162
I could suggest an alternative to a plant. You can grow a guitar out of mycelium, the root-like part of a fungus. There are already some furnitures made out of mycelium. Mycelium grows in a mold, the longer, the denser, the stronger. After you achieve the right density you dry it to kill living cells and harden material. The process is called biofacture
2 days ago | 87
Giant pumpkins can grow in a single season and make more than enough rind (two inch thickness) to make a guitar, people have made molds for gourds before and they tend to assume the shape. The problem would be hollowing out the pulp, drying it and treating it to prevent mold. It would be interesting though, especially since gourds are one of the oldest instruments ever invented by mankind.
22 hours ago | 7
Don't think in terms of tree, think a strong vine. I would try Wisteria, it's fast growing and the wood is very strong. Shape it, then cut it and let it fully dry
2 days ago
| 138
Two things; the strength of the body may not be as important as you're thinking. Stringed instruments usually have black finger boards of a reason. They are a harder wood, typically ebony, so that pressing the strings against them doesn't dent and damage the finger board. So you could extend the finger board to the scroll, or whatever you call it on a guitar (im a cellist) so that it can be the support of the neck. Also, if you wanted to do this faster. Instead of trees, you could use small woody vines. Just let them grow through your guitar lattice, and probably let them dry enough to hold their shape before removing the lattice in peices. And then coat the whole thing with epoxy for strength, and so that the sound box will function. What i said about the finger board still applies.
1 day ago (edited) | 9
The biggest issue i see (aside from time to grow) is that youd also need a way to dry out the guitar once it has achieved the desired shape. Green wood is really wet and flexible, if you want something guitar-sized that can hold string tension you'd need to dry it out without ruining the shape. You know what grows in a single season, and is happy to grow into weird shapes? Gourds and melons. What about a pumpkin ukelele?
2 days ago | 22
I think it's a really cool idea. Should be doable one way or another. The fact that it may take over a year doesn't have to be a problem - just work on some other project in the meantime. It would be pretty hilarious for the subscribers to just see the experiment design and then get a few updates along the way to see how the tree is doing haha
2 days ago
| 29
Bro even if it takes years. It would be pretty cool just to have random updates every couple months or so in between your main projects
2 days ago | 14
So, for one thing, you can enhance growth rate through indoor farming methods, that way you can generate whatever climate willow likes to grow in all year round. Should fasten things up a bit. That is energy intensive, though. Guitars always have stabilizing rods, so just let it grow around metal rod, no wood holds the tension we put on the instruments. You could try gut strings for lower tension, but really, just let it grow around a threaded rod which should poke out of both sides a bit. The wood should hold well to the threads and you can build on either side, giving you a stable access point to build off of if everything else fails. I consider it rather possible that you'd want access to a stable threaded steel rod to screw on a head to put the strings on and not have it collapse instantly. There's a lot of force on the head stock and neck connection. Also, question: Is your plan to use it while alive, or is your plan to cut it and then process it as one piece? So, if it should be played alive, then lets be honest, I don't see a working instrument coming out of that. but you could have it look like one and try yourself at creating something like PlantWave and have the plant play music through that. Different kind of life guitar, so to say. (It would be lovely if the sound samples would be heavy metal growls, so that the plant can sind about it's twisted nature (I'll see myself out) in demon tongue.) If it should get processed as one piece, then I'd grow 3 or 5 willows around a threaded rod and braid them around it, have them split into the body later. So like your pic doing a headstand. The early braided willows would give you a long and stable neck, it being multiple, it would make it easier to get to required circumferences for a guitar neck faster, and because that's the oldest wood on the plant it would be the most rigid and stable part. At touching sections in the braid, you can cut the surfaces to have them grow together. You could dry it slowly as one piece and carve the final guitar out of it. especially in braided sections, that could result in a beautiful thing. Probably not good at playing, but could look absolutely stunning. On the plus side, you can always try both in parallel. The indoor setup for one takes up enough space for two. And lets be real, you need as many tries as you can :'D I know I would.
2 days ago (edited)
| 23
Use mushrooms instead! There is a company currently trying to make essentially growable furniture with pretty great success! I would make it a nylon acoustic to reduce tension just in case it’s not super structurally sound. I think your toughest challenge will be keeping the medium from growing into the chamber and affecting the internal resonance
2 days ago | 20
Strangler figs are good at growing to the shape of whatever they're on.
1 day ago | 2
grow a massive gourd or something Pumpkin? Butternut squash? Its practically the right shape already!
2 days ago | 3
Maybe if you could get multiple trees to grow a singular guitar, it might make it quicker? You could potentially use willow for bits that will under less stress, and harder woods for other parts
2 days ago (edited) | 9
I did lawn maintenance as well as groundskeeping for a well known themepark for almost 10 years and i have a few ideas. It would end up being super sketchy to work with because of the thorns (would make for great content though 😉) and I dk what kind of tone you'd be able to get out of it, but bougainvillea might be an option. Those things will grow like crazy (especially if you either get an established plant or grow it from a cutting of a well established plant). Just know if you plant it in your yard, you will NEVER be able to get rid of it. Their root systems will literally stretch uner foundations and surround a building if not contained in some way. A real outside the box idea might be grafting. Could take something fast growing as your rootstock and use a scion from something harder and more shapable for the actual body. Both would still take time but nowhere near as full on trees. One final idea if you're just looking for the look of a guitar without worrying about tone would be growing and shaping a topiary. That is those fancy hedges you see at places like Disney shaped like different characters. They typically have metal/wood frames just for making upkeep and replacing easier, but it is possible to make them solid plant. This would be a longer term solution though unless you got a well established plant and shaped it over the course of a growing season
2 days ago | 3
Mattias Krantz
I find the idea intriguing of growing a guitar from a seed. Like, imagine instead of building a guitar for 100s of hours — you make a framework or template that a tree can grow around or inside of.
I got the idea from hearing about a hobby called “arborsculpting,” which is basically shaping a tree as it grows into functional objects, like a chair. It surprised me how much control you can actually have over the way a tree grows.
Anyway, the main issue with this idea seems to be the time it would take. Even using the fastest-growing tree in Europe (willow), it would probably take 1–2 years to grow a guitar. But willow is a very weak wood, so it likely wouldn’t be able to hold much string tension.
So I looked into more exotic options, such as bamboo. Bamboo is the fastest-growing plant and it’s also very strong. However, from my research, bamboo might grow fast, but most of the time it stays dormant in the root system, then randomly shoots up a fast-growing stalk. Bamboo is also not nearly as shapeable or able to fuse into itself the way wood can. So the aesthetics wouldn’t be very nice.
I’m putting this out there to see if any of you engineers have ideas or out-of-the-box solutions for the “growing a guitar from a seed” idea.
2 days ago | [YT] | 3,358