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My local hardwood dealer sells "South American Mahogany" which the claim is Swietenia Macrophylla although they freely admit it is not from Honduras. 2 questions:
1. Is there any way to reliably distinguish between the different species?
2. How crucial is grain orientation for necks?
I am planning on making stacked heel/scarf joint neck blanks from dressed billets but the wood I can find locally is not particularly vertical grain - they call it pattern and refer to it as "straight grain" but it looks mostly plain sawn to me. Thanks.

Mahogany from Fiji is plantation grown, and is Swietenia Macrophylla. As I understand, it is the same as Honduran.

Alex

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"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Yep, that's seems to be most common these days. The small tree size makes finding suitable planks hard.

The good news is that the grain orientation isn't terribly important, as long as it's fairly straight along the length of the neck.

I always thought that SA was the queen of all mahogany and that Honduran was just really SA in another name. It's all the same stuff and most if it is probably not from Honduras.

Honduran is great pattern making wood. But there are others.

By the way, Honduran comes from Southern Mexico well down into south American

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Joe Beaver
Maker of Sawdust

Also called Genuine mahogany sometimes.

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Pat

'Honduras' Mahogany is a trade name for S. macrophylla . The same species grows in a number of other countries, some of which restrict exports. It's all the same wood, although, like all woods, it varies fairly widely in properties from one tree to the next.

I have gotten 'mahogany' that turned out to be sapelli. It's a more gold color than the real stuff, and a bit softer, which makes it a real challenge to bend.

S. mahoganii , often called 'Cuban' or 'Caribbean' mahogany is the original 'true mahogany'. The stuff I've worked with has been harder and denser than 'Honduras' wood, and a darker brown. I suspect it's the color they're always trying to get when they use a dark finish on Honduras mahogany.

Alan's write up on how 'genuine mahogany' started as Cuban and because of short supply became Honduran, reminds me of ebony.

What, back in the days of ancient Egypt was called ebony, or black colored wood was actually African blackwood. When supplies dwindled another dark wood was used, the one we now call Ebony.

Well, it's interesting to me anyway.

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Joe Beaver
Maker of Sawdust

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

If you make a neck from one piece, not stacked, be sure you have long grain at the small of the neck.