MAHOGANY

Paul Douglass

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S E Washington State
What is the difference between African Mahogany and Genuine Mahogany? Looks like they are about the same price and looking at pictures I don't see a real difference. I'm look to use it for trim work on a wood case.

Thanks
 
http://www.mahoganyoutlet.com/wood/

Lots of good info. I like working with mahogany but, struggle with the orange tint. It is probably me because folks have taken pieces that I thought were borderline unattractive due to the color. Just goes to show you; different strokes for different folks. I now tint mahogany with a bit of blue to warm it up to my liking.
 
The furniture in my folks living room was from a movie. The movie was Lost Horizon or something similar. Anyway the furniture was very modern for its day. It was not as radical as Art Decco but it was definitely going that way from what was conventional. All of this is just leading up to the wood. The wood was "bleached Phillipine Mahogany." It had chatoyance and was knock-your-sox-off beautiful.

I don't quite understand why they used such beautiful wood. The movie was made in the "Black and White film" era. I will look and see if any pictures of it are in Myrna's picture files. I will warn you; if I find them the quality will be poor because of the Brownie camera that took them.

Man! This sure brought back a flood of memories.

Enjoy,

JimB
 
this reminds me of a deal on mahogany that i had stumbled upon years ago. one of the guys i knew who worked at the local rocklers had known an older woodworker who was selling off his lumber supply because he felt it was time to turn in his tools. i had bought a part of the turning blanks, and he grabbed all of the boards. the woodworker in question had shipped a boatload of phillippine mahogany while he was in the army over there, and all of the pieces that we had bought, still had the standard 'army green' paint on the ends. he said that everything over there was being built of it, everything from 1 story buildings, bleachers, right down to the outhouses. he would grab the scraps, and parts that weren't quite scraps, paint the ends, and have it shipped home. funny how it works out some days.
 
...the woodworker in question had shipped a boatload of phillippine mahogany while he was in the army over there, and all of the pieces that we had bought, still had the standard 'army green' paint on the ends. he said that everything over there was being built of it, everything from 1 story buildings, bleachers, right down to the outhouses. he would grab the scraps, and parts that weren't quite scraps, paint the ends, and have it shipped home. funny how it works out some days.

As recently as 1986, when I rotated back from Camp Schwab, Okinawa, all the packing boxes were made fro Philippine mahogany. I carefully disassembled those boxes and made many a project from them.

BTW, Philippine mahogany isn't a 'true' mahogany, either. It has pretty much the same grain, and the 'pinkish' tint to it, but it's a softer, lighter (in weight) wood than the true mahogany.
 
one of the large lumber yards around an hour from me, offers african and phillipine mahogany as alternatives.
both are priced in the same range as sapele and spanish cedar, approx 5.00 a bf.
Hondurian mahogany runs from 8.50 and up according to width and thickness.
Ive made chairs out of african mahogany, even though it doesnt offer the same resistance to decay as real mahogany.
 
What is the difference between African Mahogany and Genuine Mahogany? Looks like they are about the same price and looking at pictures I don't see a real difference. I'm look to use it for trim work on a wood case.

Thanks

A little bit about African Mahogany.


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Ive learned a few things in life and realized there are just some things you can never have enough of.
clamps, cash, underwear, good health, friends, duct tape, and the list can go on and on.
 
Thanks, Mike
That confirms what I was once told. When buying mahagony one rarely knows what one is really getting. One top of what that article says, there are many woods being shipped out of South America that are prohibited from being exported from there or imported into the U.S. But it is being done by labeling them as something other than what they are. And, there is just too much of it to be caught before entering the U.S. market. Some is highly toxic.
 
Potato - Potahto

The mahogany used in furniture by the British and early American was from the West Indies or Tropical America and was Swietenia mahagoni. This was considered the one "true mahogany" species at that time.
Today the most common mahogany in lumber yards is Sweitenia macrophylla or Sweitenia humilisalso from Tropical America.Two other species are also in the same family (Meliaceae) - Khaya (Africa) and Toona (China). Mahogany from India/Indonesia can be of several different families unrelated to the Meliaceae family but also could be Swietenia as it was planted in those areas in the 1990's to be grown for commercial use. A visit to any lumber yards can turn up any number of "mahoganies" for sale. Even the big box shores sold "virola" plywood, which if stained correctly could fool a lot of people into thinking it was mahogany.
I say if it looks good to you, then that is good enough. After all, good looks are in the eye of the beholder.
 
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