State of the Art and Prospects of Sounding Timber Selection, Targeted Use and Cultivation in the Forests of Russia
A brief excursus of domestic and foreign literature sources concerning the concept of sounding wood and the diagnostic methods of its technical properties in the targeted selection of standing trees and assortments is presented. Two concepts, which are used by the instrument-making masters in the selection of necessary material are analyzed: evaluation of its quality on the basis of indirect biomorphological indicators of a growing tree and direct measurements of physical and acoustic performance of wood. In the first case, the sufficient information can be obtained by analyzing the following features: the species, timber macrostructure, trunk habit, size, cones color, and most importantly, the form of their seed scales, color and structure of the bark, the type of tree branching. Detection of an acoustic constant on the basis of cross frequency and amplitude characteristics presents more authentic data on sounding properties of wood than the speed of sound passage along-the-grain. This way allows us to perform the early nondestructive diagnostics of resonating characteristics of spruce wood in the stage of undergrowth or young stand stage. The paper gives the information with a reference to the historical facts about the reserves in the forests of Russia of spruce wood and bird's-eye maple especially valuable for musical instruments manufacturing. Despite this fact the system of the rational and targeted use of such wood has not been established in Russia. The paper suggests promising ways of cultivation and preservation of the sounding spruce gene resources in the forests of Russia. The author offers to make some amendments to the Forest Code of the Russian Federation taking into account the presentday market relations in the forest exploitation.