I just hit the local mill and bought enough “cedar” to build a sauna bench. Of course there was not enough white or western red to do anything. So I bought the new inventory brought up from South America or at least south of Mexico. the material I bought (at 3.15 bdft.) was “Utz Cedar”. It is clear & straight grained and looks a lot like a creamy pink blond Mahogany. Same type of grain structure too.
After searching the web I find only some guy’s business in Iowa who matches all of the key words. Not helpful.
What is this Cyprus? Cedar? Idunno
I’m stumped. Oh yes I will build the bench anyway. Trial by fire I guess.
Jack of all trades and master of none – you got a problem with that?
Replies
Sounds like Spanish cedar?? I've only seen SC once.
Well they did have spanish cedar as well. SC was a browner color and available only in tiny pieces. This was 13 foot long 9 inches wide and an inch thick. As well as clear.
Harder than I remember any other cedar. It is harder than 2.5 (which is the hardness of a thumbnail I think)
thanksJack of all trades and master of none - you got a problem with that?
Booch, it could still be one of the "Spanish cedars." There are at least a half dozen species in this genus: Cedrela.
Does the wood have a resinous scent and a slightly oily feel? Also, does it appear to be just a bit more ring-porous than genuine mahogany?
Ring porous like mahogany for certain. In fact it has the bands of rays (Zylem) that makes me think of mahogany. It is density that really throws me. It is about as dense as maple and nearly as hard.
Now as for the smell. In the same effort I have been cutting up T&G cedar (which I take to be white cedar) and Red Cedar that cost me more dearly than the Utz. In a 10 point rating Red is right up there with snuff, say 9 on my scale. The white rates about a 6, and the Utz is in the neighborhood of 3 or less.
Certainly Utz is resinous but on a rating of sneezing walnut would be 4 or 5 on that same scale.
I even cut myself re-ripping it thru the tablesaw. The corner on the planed surface to the previously ripped edge was sharp enough to give one of those 3/4 inch slices in the side of a finger that I get from walnut. White or red don't hold that kind of corner.
If you are stumped or just curious I can throw a crossection and a ripped sliver in the mail. Just ask.Jack of all trades and master of none - you got a problem with that?
Booch, the maple-like hardness (and the lack of strong scent) would pretty much take it out of contention as a Spanish cedar (Cedrela.) Also, I've searched the common name; Utz, and can find no reference.
It's a pure guess, but there is a group of timbers in the ipe genus (Tabebuia) native to northeastern South America that are sometimes referred to as the white-cedar group. They tend to be a little softer than those members of this genus that are marketed as ipe, but still pretty hard and heavy (in the hard maple range.) They produce a slightly coarser textured and usually lighter colored wood than ordinary ipe.
Also, there are a couple of other canditates I can think of...another genus in the mahogany family (Carapa) produces a wood sometimes referred to as cedro macho. It is heavier and usually a little finer textured than genuine mahogany, but has mahogany-like anatomy.
If you'd like to send a sample, I'd be happy to compare it to what I have in my sample collection. I think you can E-mail me somehow via this board (beats me how that works, though -?)
Jon, if you get the sample and a positive ID on this wood, please please let us know what it turns out to be! I'm very curious.
Now, Jon, remedial forum-navigation -- to email a member, you have two choices, both simple.
Click on the members name (at the top of a post), his/her pop-up frame appears. The first link you see is "Send E-mail" -- click on that -- or--->
"Reply" to a post of the person, and at the bottom of the composition box, just above the orange buttons, there's a choice to "Reply via E-mail"forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Booch --
If that smell you mention is kinda like sweaty horses, this may be the same stuff my lumber dealer is selling as "South American Alder." All the other characteristics you mention match. Unfortunately, I don't know what it really is either. The name must be some importer's fabrication; the wood certainly isn't related to our North American alder.
Jamie
Sounds like Ipe to me. Hard stuff! Some people call it Ironwood. Great for outdoors though.
Most, if not all, Ipe is sold for decking and can come in long lenghts and generally will be about 6" wide and may have rounded corners. All I've seen of the decking stuff was a reddish bown. I was told by one guy that all Ipe that is coming into this country is air dried to 15-18% EMC. He had never seen kiln dried Ipe. Very prone to hairline checking after further drying.
PlaneWood by Mike_in_Katy (maker of fine sawdust!)PlaneWood
Lot of foreign wood coming in these days from places where there is no English name for the tree so the wood gets a name of some similar wood when it arrives. I recently got some "Chinese Oak" which didn't come from China and I was told it came from South America. It's actually nothing like oak - more like a hard alder.
"Chinese oak" sounds more like an euphemism for "cheap and nasty oak"
sorry, couldn't resist.
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