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Got some nice clean quartersawn chunks of Paulownia, thinking it might make nice classical necks (probably with CF and/or truss rod).
Any reasons not to?

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Hmmm. Must be different from the Paulownia I've got, which is 1/2 a step up from balsa.

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

Hmmm. Looks like this may be a case of mistaken identity.
Probably not this ship's carpenter's first (he was for 20 years).
He was advertising large one piece quartersawn Honduran Mahogany worktops.
Worth checking out I thought, even for a 400 mile return journey.
It turned out to be (beautifully) jointed very plain Sapele.
I've just checked the S.G. of this "Koto Wood" as he called it and it pans out at 0.40 air dried. Paulownia should be 0.25/28 ish
Genuine mistake, he apologized profusely and gave me this wood free for my trouble, maybe 8/10 neck's worth.
I bought some nice black walnut and maple for skunk stripes for his trouble taking me to see the wood on a Saturday night.
I'm wondering what he's given me?
Further investigation is warranted.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

FWIW I've been wanting to try Paulownia for a top. I know of a dulcimer maker who swears by it.

How about some pictures?

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Old growth, shmold growth!

I'm on it!

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Pics of mystery wood.
Medulary rays, some nice silk on the quarter.
Yellowish rather than tan.
No appreciable smell (maybe slightly peppery?) freshly sanded or planed. Then again I can't smell the Cedro.
Specific gravity 0.40 g/cm2
Rings fairly well when tapped, maybe not so bright and sustained as the Cedro
What do we have?

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I think I know where the confusion comes from.

Paulownia, or Paulownia tomentosa is the tree that has the common name "Empress tree". It's soft and fast growing and is used for tops of Japanese instruments, most notably the Koto. The wood is sometimes called koto because of this.

There is another Koto wood, Pterygota macrocarpa, which is the wood that you've got, I think. It's sometimes (sort of incorrectly) also called paulownia as a common name, but it's from Africa and is a totally different wood from the Japanese Paulownia.

If you do a google image search with the latin names and "wood", or "koto wood" you'll see the difference.

cheers

Some of the pictures look very similar, but the trouble is the air dry specific gravity of the Pterygota macrocarpa is quoted as 0.59, i.e. 50% higher than what I've got - big difference.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I think what you have is Avodire.. I have a large stock of it, and have cut several thousand sets of it. Sometimes it is called "white mahogany", very similar in weight, grain structure, working properties to Honduras mahogany. That is what I think it is.
Best, Aaron.

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Guitar Maker and Purveyor of the World's Finest Tonewoods
http://www.aaronhixguitars.com/
http://stores.ebay.com/A-Hix-Tonewood-a ... r-Supplies

BTW, I have used Avodire for necks with really good success.

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Guitar Maker and Purveyor of the World's Finest Tonewoods
http://www.aaronhixguitars.com/
http://stores.ebay.com/A-Hix-Tonewood-a ... r-Supplies

Aaron, you are not a man I would argue about wood with, and it certainly looks similar, but,..
S.G. still seem so different, over 0.50 for Avodire.
This wood is 0.40 air dried, or 25 lb/cubic foot - pretty light.
That's about the same as Yellow Cedar.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Looks offhand like a Shorea to me. Hard to say though, could be Koto.

I'm beginning to wonder if it's Obeche.
S.G. is correct, color is right and mine exhibits markings in places like this example from Google images.
And a couple of the wood identification sites say the quarter sawn grain can exhibit medullary rays.

The plank below right has what may be a shallow wormhole in the middle of the dark streak.
The writing says "Silentnight" and it may have been destined for a UK mattress/bed company named that.( The guy who gave me it buys bankruptcy stock) Type of use a plain looking lightweight timber might be used for.
For this use, the wood would be hidden in a divan type bed.
Color is washed out because of artificial lighting.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Unfortunately i can not give any specifics but i have handled Paulownia before and it is amazingly lightweight. if i were to guess it would be half the weight of spruce if i held the same sized boards. Hope that helps a little.

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久保
美智え

I'm with Mr. Hix... that's avodire. Super chatoyant and the color, faces, and end grain (at least the amount of detail I can pick out from the picture) look just right. There's usually a lot of variation among trees when it comes to density... I wouldn't use that as a determining factor unless it was waaay off.

It looks a little like jelutong which was used in England by pattern makers at some point. Works nicely a little lighter than hog & stable. See if you can look at the end grain under magnification & compare.

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Mike McNerney

The paulownia I have handled is ring-porous, while that wood appears to be diffuse-porous.
Avodire would be my guess as well. Specific gravity is not a very reliable way to identify wood.
Considering its weight, I see no reason not to use it for classical necks...particularly with some added reinforcement.

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John

Asian Mystery Wood.

That's my guess.

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Old growth, shmold growth!

I concur, extremely light weight. Pale white color.

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