Help identifying sapele or meranti
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- This topic has 9 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 4 years, 4 months ago by Daniel Barber.
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16 November 2019 at 1:02 am #627719
im not sure either, but i have a bunch of that and i’ve been calling it mahogany…
16 November 2019 at 1:33 am #627730I don’t think it’s Sapele, which has a very distinctly defined revering grain in the quartersawn face.
My guess is it is something in the Shorea group ( Meranti, Luan, etc)
Take a shaving or two. the fresh wood will have a distinct cedar-like smell if it’s Sapele. Makes me sneeze.
Is there some reason you ruled out Khaya?
- This reply was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Larry Geib.
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You must be logged in to view attached files.16 November 2019 at 6:00 pm #627917Yeah, I suppose it could be. It’s in the same group as Sapele (Entandrophragma) and would have the same Cedar-like smell when you work it.
all these woods are an attempt to find tropical woods that match the wonderful workability of the real thing, the Swietenia group, and especially Cuban mahogany which hasn’t been seen in the commercial market since the Cuban revolution.it was almost all logged off under capitalism. ( I rebuilt the transom of a little sailing skiff out of the stuff when I was a kid. I had no idea at the time how precious that board was, and I don’t think the guys in the boatyard I hung around who sold it to me for a song knew, either). Export was banned in 1946, but it was still commonly available by 1962. A clean end grain view ( planed, not sawn ) would help. The real mahoganies look different than the impostors.
The wood Database has a good article on sorting out the different so-called mahoganies that is worth a read.
It could even be the real thing. Here is the wood database picture of the quartersawn face of Swietenia Macrophylia
( Honduran mahogany)Attachments:
You must be logged in to view attached files.16 November 2019 at 9:31 pm #627959It definitely smells when you cut it
Also its a little dusty when cutting -
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