ROASTED MAPLE: Torrefied Guitar Neck Wood Guide 2024

Roasted Maple Neck Wood

When maple wood is roasted, its stability increases. Considering maple is already pretty stable to begin with, roasting almost seems unnecessary. However, tempered tonewoods are popular with guitar builders in 2023.

Not surprisingy, maple is frequently used as guitar neck wood. Jeff Owens of Fender Guitars, one of the largest users of maple neck wood, writes ominously of “tremendous forces that conspire to bend, warp and bow the neck, preventing proper intonation.”

In addition to using metal truss rods, Fender, Gibson and many other guitar manufacturers utilize tempered maple neck blanks and fretboards to keep their instrument necks stable.

Roasted Maple (also known as Baked, Caramelized, or Torrified Maple) is maple that has been heat treated in a specialized vacuum oven to remove sugars, moisture, and other impurities.

source: Warmoth

What is Baked Maple?

Tempered Maple is kiln dried maple wood that has been thermally treated in a roasting kiln.

Earlier this year, we wrote an article about roasted woods. If you haven’t already checked it out, you can find it here. Also, we just added a page with information on Baked Poplar, as well.

Is Torrified Maple the Same as Roasted Maple?

Yes. Torrefication is the same process as roasting, carmelizing or baking. Accordingly, it is maple that is kiln treated at high temperatures to remove moisture, sugars and other wood impurities. The result is a superior, improved and stabilized neck.

Additionally, torrefied is sometimes alternatively spelled torrified. Both refer to the same kiln drying process.

Roasted Maple Lumber: Why is it rarely available?

Typically, maple necks and guitar parts are cut to dimension prior to roasting. Therefore, there is not much roasted maple lumber available for sale in the marketplace. The reason is that the roasting process is costly. Accordingly, wise woodworkers avoid roasting any wood un-necessarily. Instead, all width waste and cut-offs are removed prior to torrefication.

Is a Roasted Maple Neck Worth It?

Roasted maple necks cost more than unroasted. Typically, roasted maple sells at a premium of 50-100% over unroasted maple. Thus, the actual upcharge may be $50-$150. However, the up-charge is often a bargain.

The main reason is that increased stability means easier and longer lasting set ups. Since the average lifespan of an electric guitar is several decades, set-ups costs are significant.

What is a Guitar Set Up?

A guitar set up is the process of bring a guitar into intonation. Basically, restoring optimal play-ability to the instrument.

A guitar setup is a series of adjustments made to an electric or an acoustic guitar to ensure proper health and playability, and is considered “basic maintenance”. Performing a setup addresses changes a guitar goes through over time and returns it to its proper condition.

source: What is a Guitar Set up and Why Do You Need It? (Bananas.com)

How Much Does a Set Up Cost?

According to a New York Times article, professional instrument set ups cost between $50-$100.

Generally speaking, a professional setup costs around $50, but it could be upwards of $100 if there’s a lot of work to be done. New strings are usually part of the setup process, since the gauges of the strings affect intonation.

source: Should You Have Your Guitar or Bass Professionally Set Up? (New York Times)

Accordingly, at a rate of two set ups per year, a player may spend over $5000 over the lifetime of a guitar.

Since neck instability causes many intonation problems, a more stable neck means less set ups needed.

Additionally, many manufacturers warranty their instruments. In the past, some guitar companies even omitted birdseye maple necks from their warranties. Specifically, this is was due to difficulties controlling wood movement. Interestingly, roasted birdseye maple necks were covered!

Accordingly, manufacturers often absorb the cost of fixing intonation problems, regardless of cause. Thus, using roasted wood saves guitar companies significant money through claims prevention.

Clearly, roasted wood is a win-win for both players and luthiers.

Does Roasting Improve Maple?

Torrefied maple, also known as roasted, caramelized, baked, vulcanized, thermally treated or tempered, is superior to unroasted maple in 3 ways:

Stability. Tempered maple is much less likely to respond to changes in moisture levels than unroasted maple.
Resonance & Tone. This is a controversial opinion. However, much of the process behind thermally treated maple is similar to an accelerated aging of the wood. In fact, Dana Bourgeois an early proponent of torrefacation in luthiery, describes the process to Fretboard Journal. Many players and builders prefer the resonance and tone of old growth wood over new wood. Guitar.com performed an informal independent study which concluded that roasted wood imparts vintage tone and dynamic response properties.
Appearance. While the cosmetic appearance of torrefied maple verses regular maple is subjective, roasting brings out rich colors and contrasts in the wood. In fact, the look of tempered maple is similar to that of well finished wood.

In September of 2019, Fender Musical Instruments released roasted maple guitar necks for sale online. Fender gave several reasons why roasting improves maple wood. Here is what Guitar World reports:

Roasted maple necks are purported to be more resistant to humidity shifts owing to the removal of moisture at the roasting stage. Plus, their darker hues look more appealing than plain maple, which can sometimes appear somewhat anaemic.

Fender is also claiming its roasted offerings deliver “more sustain”, but we’re not quite sure we buy that.

source: Astley-Brown, M (18 September, 2019) Fender Has Started Selling Roasted Maple Strat and Tele Necks. https://www.guitarworld.com/news/fender-has-started-selling-roasted-maple-strat-and-tele-necks

Quartersawn Roasted Maple

Quarter Sawn Maple is more stable than flat-sawn. Thus, is roasting quartersawn wood necessary? Not surprisingly, baking wood improves stability regardless of grain orientation. Therefore, torrefied wood benefits rift & quartered lumber, even if it’s to a lesser degree.

Do Roasted Maple Necks Need a Finish?

Although torrefied necks do not require finishing, most luthiers apply a finish. This is often done in same way that unroasted necks are finished. Common treatments include Tru-oil, wax, etc.

However, builders who do not want to apply finish can also burnish the neck to mimic a finished appearance.

Burnishing is done by rubbing two pieces of wood together. The heat from the friction rubs away soft, dried cell walls and exposes the harder cells. These hard cell walls do not absorb stain or finishes, but they have a glossy sheen that makes finishing products unnecessary.

source: What is Burnishing?( Kitchen Cabinet Kings)

Are Roasted Maple Necks Brittle?

One of the disadvantages of torrefaction is that exposure to high temperatures for extended periods of time makes maple brittle. However, this typically comes into play with darker roast options. In fact, this is one of the reasons why most torrefied maple suppliers carry medium to light roasted colors.

Brittle Maple resulting from aggressive roasting causes a number of machining problems:

Screws that strip out or fail to hold in tempered maple.
Maple splits when machined, drilled or dropped.

How to Prevent Brittle Vulcanized Maple

There is no way to reverse brittle maple once the wood is roasted. Thus, the way to prevent brittle maple is to use medium to low roasting temperatures and short kiln run times.

Think of baked maple like toasting bread. Once bread passes a certain threshold of toaster heat, it is irreparably burnt.

What Color is Tempered Maple?

The color of tempered maple is a direct function of two variables: kiln temperature and kiln roasting time. Therefore, there is no one color for vulcanized maple.

When thermally treating good quality northern White Hard Maple, it enters the kiln with bright white sapwood. The color darkens progressively over time. To get a darker color, keep in the kiln longer and bake it at a higher temperature. However, as stated above, longer exposure to high heat raises the risk of damaging maple wood.

Is Lightly Baked Maple Wood the Solution?

We’ve written a lot about the danger of high heat exposure to maple roasted wood. One way to avoid that risk is to use a low vulcanization kiln temperature.

However, that solution is not ideal. While low heat thermal treating leaves your maple lumber structurally intact, it will leave the maple moisture content high. Also, it will not darken the maple wood’s color tone significantly.

Roasted wood does not pass a certain tipping point in the kiln and transform into tempered wood. Rather, the caramelization process works like a sliding scale in proportion to roasting kiln temperature and kiln exposure time.

5/4 Roasted Plain-sawn White Hard Maple bass guitar neck blanks.

Plainsawn Baked Maple: White Hard

Plain-sawn or flat-sawn White Hard Maple is the most common grain orientation. Accordingly, plain-sawn roasted necks appear on guitars more often than quartersawn or figured roasted necks.

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