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Same questions as the Macacauba thread.
Has anyone built with these? How do they bend? How do they sound?

For my tastes the sets listed by Hibdon look great and the price is fantastic. But even $60 or $70 is too much if the wood isn't interested in becoming a guitar.

Thanks in advance.

Phil

I bought a few of sets of T'zalam from Hibdon a couple of years ago. I started building a spec guitar with one set but got too busy to complete it. It bends very easily and, in my hands (and ear), it felt like it would make a fine guitar. It's hard, medium dense, no crystalline ring but a solid musical tap with lots of bass sustain. Color is like English walnut. The sets I bought have some nice flame. I think it's a worthy option.

I have some left over Machiche from a furniture project about 20 years ago. I've always regretted that I don't have a piece long enough for sides because I thought it would be a good guitar wood. Maybe a uke some day.

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I built my first SS with T'zalam (Mayan Walnut). It is an OM I found it to be quite easy to work and bend, but I found that there was quite a bit of spring back, but it could have been my inexperience and I bent by hand on a hot pipe. I bought it as it was inexpensive and it was my first attempt at building. The set I had finished beautifully (shellac). It didn't look to be real interesting until I applied the finish, and then it seemed to come alive, with a 3D look. Sap woods centers are more of a creamy color. I used plain Koa for the bindings, and when finish was applied, it is hard to tell the two woods apart.

Chechen is a wonderful wood, capable of outrageous figure. It bent nicely on a Fox bender and held its shape well. The guitar had everything going for it and was an easy sell at the NAMM show.

Thanks for the positive reports! Any others?

If you have a resaw BS worldwide liquidators in olathe KS ,is selling their flooring some nice santos mahogany also called balsam , jatoba, and tzalam or carib koa the pieces are for flooring and only 2.5in wide but the price is right 2-3$ a sq ft, their going out of business. I have yet to slice any of it up my resaw blade is dull.

I used to rep for Hibdon and have handled many pieces of the woods you mention. Primavera is lightweight and resonant. We gave away a few sets of it to builders who said they'd make a guitar from it and post the results. Max Bishop is the only one I am aware of that actually made one, but there may be more. He made a flamenco with it and thought it was well suited for this purpose. You might ask him to post some comments about primavera. I had a number of conversations with Bruce Sexauer about chechen. He said it made a "superior guitar" (his words). Gibson made some J-45s out of machiche. It looks kind of like a red mahogany, but is denser. T'zalam is like a cross between mahogany and walnut, kind of resembling koa. Not a terribly zingy tap tone, but chechen does not either. Gibson is using chechen for fingerboards presently and calling it "Caribbean rosewood". Macacauba and granadillo are roughly the same thing: different species of platymiscium.

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Stay with the happy people.
--Reynolds Large

Thanks guys. Always good to learn from the experience of others. Sounds like I need to pull the trigger on some of these species.

Phil

Thinking about building a deck out of machiche. Cheaper and better looking than ipe.

...But I did build a guitar our of apitong which turned out sounding pretty good for a truck bed floor.

-jd

Many people, including myself, are allergic to machiche.

Years ago, a girlfriend of mine ended up in the hospital
because I had machiche dust on my clothes.