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HELP me identify this wood please!
http://www.luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=23839		 Page 1 of 1
Author:  vachterman [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 3:56 pm ]
Post subject:  HELP me identify this wood please!
so we did some cleaning of the carpentry and there was tons of wood there from yeeeeaaaaars ago!
all of it was easily "tagged".
however, i came across a bunch of boards, all of which around 50" long and 6" wide, which neither i,nor the original owner of the place, could identify for sure.

a bit of a background, over here, when people say "mahogany" they actually do mean sapele.
that what all cabinet makers around here sell as mahogany.
if you really know your way with wood, then you'd might actually get african mahogany.

and i've worked my fair share of both these woods.
i've also carved more than a few honduras mahogany necks and have the good fortune to build a guitar with cuban mahogany B&S.

now, these boards i found are very light colored compared to the african/sapele i know.
it also feels lighter than any piece of african/sapele i ever held.
the grain/texture too, seems "finer" then those two.
they exhibit fantastic "interlocking grain stripes".

holding a board next to both honduras M. and cuban M. , the grain really looks much like the cuban(some off cuts i have left from sets purchased from BobC and Steve @ colonialtonewoods). same gos for the color. the oxidized boards prior to planning had a light brown color to them much like my cuban leftovers while the freshly planned seemed golden brown a lot like some honduran i have around.

i took some pics, even bothered a friend with a decent camera to do so.
figured the better quality the pics are, the easier it'll be to identify the wood.
what is it then?

Image

Image

Image

and to thank you all:
Image
Author:  SteveCourtright [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 4:20 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
That looks a lot like sapele to me.
Author:  Mike Collins [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 4:52 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
Looks like African to me .
But wood species are so mingled because of financial pressures .
But Sapele is African also !!!
It's hard to tell anymore !

Just use it & enjoy it !

Mc
[:Y:]
Author:  Mike_P [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 4:52 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
Avodire
Author:  bluescreek [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 4:54 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
It is African Mahogany , It is a pretty good guitar wood.
Author:  Kent Chasson [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 5:51 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
If it's as light weight as you say, it's probably Khaya, yet another wood sometimes know as "African Mahogany". Khaya gets ribboning much like Sapele but is way less dense and very hairy. Practically impossible to scrape or plane cleanly. Great neck wood but not a good tonewood unless you like light weight, very high damping wood.

Too bad when trade names confuse things. Wish we could get rid of them.
Author:  Colonial Tonwds [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 7:31 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
That's African mahogany.
Author:  Mike_P [ Thu Sep 17, 2009 11:52 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
I based my 'guess' on the fact that the OP indicated he had experience with both sapele and khaya (generically known as african mahogany)...I can say I have never seen khaya have figure like that...notice how the ropey aspect is ~20° from the actual grain flow (based upon what I see in picture #2)..also evident in #2 is the fact that the piece is totally quartersawn which, as I noted, I've never seen figure up like that in khaya...of course that means nothing as it is quite possible that said piece of wood is khaya or sapele...

the OP also states that this wood has been around for "yeeeeaaaaars"...assuming it hasn't been freshly surfaced I would think that if it was khaya or sapele it would be a lot darker that is shown in those pictures, and said logic would lead me to believe that it could indeed be avodire (which is usually lighter)...

FWIW I was told a long time ago that there are actually at least 3 types of khaya...I think I've probably used all 3...I can think of the typical stuff that has good working properties that I can place into 2 groups...one smells really nasty when cut and the other is fine...and I've dealt with a 3rd type that I would classify as having very stringy grain patterns that tend to be very difficult to work with as they tear up (not out...actually leaving 'strings' of grain still attached to the board) when planed and are kind of tenacious to sand out...
Author:  vachterman [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 1:21 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
while i understand the use of "common names" might be a source for confusion, and botanical names are preferable, i'm not quite sure yet(even with all great replies i got).

just for comparison, i took this pic.
it shows an african neck blank i got from Steve @ colonialtonewoods, a figured african neck blank i got locally and a sapele guitar back.
next to them are two much brighter colored pieces, one is the heavily "ropey" board from yesterday and the other is a flatsawn piece from the same bunch.

of course colors vary greatly within a specie but that much?
also, if i compare the grain and pore structure between the lighter colored boards and all three darker ones, it seems like the grain is a lot less visible and less "tight" on the bright ones.

Image

of course, since the boards i found have been laying around here for at least 20 years,are free of cracks/checks and most are perfectly quartered i will use them regardless of their exact botanical name, but curiosity got the best of me on this one.

thanks all!
Author:  Kent Chasson [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 2:19 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
That's interesting. I've bought several hundred board feet of Khaya over the years and I've never seen any that was at all similar to Hunduran. While some has been about as dense as the lightest Honduran, it's all had that hairy texture and it sounds like cardboard when tapped. Never seen any as dark as in that picture either.

I've seen Khaya, Sapele, and Meranti called African Mahogany and I find it impossible to know what people are talking about when using that term. Most of the guitars I've seen called African Mahogany are Sapele.

That dark stuff looks more like Meranti to me. It tends to be reddish brown, denser than Honduran, huge pores, and wide radial flecking when perfectly quartered.
Author:  vachterman [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 3:36 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
Kent Chasson wrote:
That's interesting. I've bought several hundred board feet of Khaya over the years and I've never seen any that was at all similar to Hunduran. While some has been about as dense as the lightest Honduran, it's all had that hairy texture and it sounds like cardboard when tapped. Never seen any as dark as in that picture either.

I've seen Khaya, Sapele, and Meranti called African Mahogany and I find it impossible to know what people are talking about when using that term. Most of the guitars I've seen called African Mahogany are Sapele.

That dark stuff looks more like Meranti to me. It tends to be reddish brown, denser than Honduran, huge pores, and wide radial flecking when perfectly quartered.


true, and that is why i'm a bit puzzled here.
the darkest board is one i got from colonial tonewoods and i trust steve to know his wood.

it's the long,bright colored boards that interest me the most.
they wood, as can be seen, is much brighter in color and is noticeably less "hairy" than the african i have.
Author:  caribou [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 8:06 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
Sapele has a very specific smell, very "spicy" (but sweet too). Easy to recognized... when you know it... Others African "mahoganies" has a less specific smell.
Author:  Mark A Thorpe [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 10:52 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
It looks like African Mahogany to me. A nicely quartered piece, which would give it that ribbon look. That's a nice piece of wood you have there.
Author:  Kent Chasson [ Fri Sep 18, 2009 11:42 am ]
Post subject:  Re: HELP me identify this wood please!
vachterman wrote:
true, and that is why i'm a bit puzzled here.
the darkest board is one i got from colonial tonewoods and i trust steve to know his wood.


No doubt. Maybe he'll chime back in and tell us what species it is.

In the lumber world, there seems to be a pretty good consensus that African Mahogany = Khaya. It seems to be the guitar world that has mucked it up, possibly starting with Taylor originally marketing their Sapele guitars as African Mahogany. I'm pretty sure Doc Watson's Gallagher that was referred to for years as African was in fact Sapele so maybe that's where it started.

Anyway, although they can look similar, the physical properties of Khaya and Sapele are about as different as big leaf Maple is from Honduran.
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