Mahogany...

[NancyJohnson]

I was having a clear out in my garage (like you do) and found three mahogany boards...each roughly eight feet long, a foot wide, inch thick. I forgot they were in there. My father in law gave them to me; they were from a university that were breaking down their old science labs and he procured them rather than them going into landfill. I was wondering whether these are enough to consider a build project of some kind. There strikes me as being enough wood to actually make something with, maybe a couple of basses.

I haven't considered building anything for a while - too happy with what I've got. So a question. Are these planks worth much? If I did decide to approach a luthier to build something (it would likely be a Thunderbird style bass), would the worth of this wood reduce the price of the project?

Opinions?
P

[EliasMooseblaster]

Given that a T-bird is traditionally a neck-through design, and assuming you'd use something like maple for the neck, you'd probably have enough mahogany there to make the "wings" for a couple of Thunderbirds!

I've got three basses now with mahogany bodies. It's a lovely wood - if a bit on the heavy side - and a delight to work with (one of the three was a 'Frankenbass' assembled from eBay spare parts). Whatever you do, make sure you turn it into something beautiful!

[Roland Rock]

Are you sure it's mahogany? I only ask because any wood I've had reclaimed from old science labs (about four labs) the benches have been made from oily tropicals like teak or iroko, both of which can look quite dark red when old and used.

[Dr M]

The trouble you're likely to have is the fact they're about one inch thick (25mm). Most bodies tend to be about 35 - 40mm. You'll probably find one piece is too thin, but two pieces are too thick and weigh a ton.

[quote name='Roland Rock' timestamp='1368112231' post='2073365']
Are you sure it's mahogany? I only ask because any wood I've had reclaimed from old science labs (about four labs) the benches have been made from oily tropicals like teak or iroko, both of which can look quite dark red when old and used.
[/quote]

My Dad's found the same thing, although he's had some success using iroko. It's got quite a nice colour and a similar feel to korena. The grain can be quite deep though.

[Lfalex v1.1]

[quote name='Dr M' timestamp='1368116811' post='2073447']
The trouble you're likely to have is the fact they're about one inch thick (25mm). Most bodies tend to be about 35 - 40mm. You'll probably find one piece is too thin, but two pieces are too thick and weigh a ton.



My Dad's found the same thing, although he's had some success using iroko. It's got quite a nice colour and a similar feel to korena. The grain can be quite deep though.
[/quote]

A solution might be to make the "wings" of a through neck 2 pieces thick. Cut them to a rough shape. Chamber them before glueing them together and then contour them etc.

Just a thought for the brave/skilled or those with too much time/ too many router bits on their hands...

Edited May 9, 2013 by Lfalex v1.1

[MilkyBarKid]

[list]
[*]The value of the wood would depend on the species - there are a lot of woods people call mahogany which aren't true mahogany but rather things like sapele - I seem to remember true mahogany is called something like macrophilia swietiana or something similar. The thickness would probably be ok for a luthier who wanted to face the guitar with laminates of another type of wood. I don't know what cut of wood luthiers favour but quartersawn is the most stable (as far as I remember) and I guess that's pretty important in a musical instrument; look at the direction of the rings on the end of the plank and you should be able to work out how the plank was cut (look up pictures of quartersawn planks on the internet)
[/list]

[Commando Jack]

It's easy to laminate the pieces together and plane them to thickness so I wouldn't be worrying about the thicknesses of the boards too much. It's definitely good for the body of the bass, but depending on the species it may not be great for the neck. There are a number of species of tree that all give you mahogany wood (Honduran, Brazilian, etc) and they have different strengths and hardnesses depending on that. A luthier may be able to tell you more but if you don't ask, you don't get. If it happens to be valuable, maybe you can work out a deal to offset the cost of the bass for the rest of the wood if you don't have any other uses for it. It wouldn't be a hell of a lot but better than nothing.

Btw the wood in our labs was teak from what I remember.

And whatever you do, leave it a natural finish!

[Mr. Foxen]

I think school benches were Sapele.

Edit: Quartersawn stuff is only a big deal in necks. If you are worried about neck stability, don't use mahogany.

Edited May 15, 2013 by Mr. Foxen