Help Identifying Wood

[bad]

My birthday was the beginning of May. One of my gifts was a 48 piece exotic assortment of wood from Rockler. It's a great gift. Unfortunately, none of the wood is identified. There are 4 pieces of 12 different types of wood. I can identify a couple of them but as for the rest, I'm not sure. There is a list of all of the types of wood on the outside of the box. The types of wood are:

Bocote
Chechen
Cocobolo
Ebony
Katalox
Olivewood
Pink Ivory
Mopani
Argentine Lingum Vitae
Redheart
Honduran Rosewood
Tamboti

My guess would be that Bocote is #7, Ebony is #4, Pink Ivory is #11. As for the rest, I've never seen them before. If anybody is willing to help, I'd appreciate it.

 

[1080Wayne]

5 possibly olive , 7 almost certainly bocote , lignum vitae can have a greenish cast , which I can`t see in any of the photos , rosewood 2 or 6 ??

 

[ngeb528]

#5 may be Olivewood, #10 looks like Redheart & #12 looks like Cocobolo.

 

[Seer]

1 could be kingwood, 10 Redheart, 12 Cocobola, 9 Pau Ferro,

 

[bad]

Thanks for your replies. So far the consencus seems to be:

#4 Ebony
#5 Olivewood
#7 Bocote
#9 Argentine Lingum
#10 Redheart
#11 Pink Ivory
#12 Cocobolo

I know that the colours don't come up very well but I was thinking that #12 was probably Honduran Rosewood. It's very red. But then again I have no idea what Cocobolo looks like.

 

[Seer]

1 is most likely the Rosewood especially with that color heartwood it will make some pretty nice pieces

 

[Russianwolf]

Number 1 is Katalox given the names you listed. Sapwood is cream colored white the heartwood is a dark purplish.


#2 looks like Honduras Rosewood to me


On most of the others its hard to tell since the wax is masking the true color/grain.

I think I agree with bad's opinion on the others

#4 Ebony
#5 Olivewood
#7 Bocote
#9 Argentine Lingum
#10 Redheart
#11 Pink Ivory
#12 Cocobolo

So that leave #3, 6 and 8 to be Chechen, Tamboti and Mopani which I'm not familiar with.

 

[bad]

Thanks Mike. I had no idea what katalox is.

The first time I heard about katalox is when some evil* person put it into the IAP birthday bash word jumble. I figured out the rest of the words in about 15 min. but I spent the rest of my day off trying to figure that one out.

*When I say evil, I mean it in the nicest most complementary way possible.

 

[bad]

Ok, my wife actually came up with the idea. I googled the last three woods and here's what I came up with.

#3 Mopane
#6 Chechen
#8 Tamboti

If anyone feels that anything on this list is wrong please let me know either by posting or PM. I'm planning on selling these pens after I've turned them and I'd hate to be misleading any of my customers.

Thanks again for everyone's help.

 

[bradh]

I thought # 8 or #2 was Cocobolo.

A good site to use for this is hobbit house:
http://www.hobbithouseinc.com/personal/woodpics/

 

[fafow]

Number 2 looks to me more like tambotie, but I am not positive. One way to tell is to smell the wood. Of the woods you listed that are in the box, tamobote and lignum are very aromatic. The easy way to tell between redheart and pink ivory is the weight. Pink ivory is much heavier. Lignum is also a heavier wood. It is supposed to sink in water as well (don't know if that holds true when it is covered in wax, though).

 

[hunter-27]

#8 looks to be the lignum, it is more yellow/brown untill it ages to greenish.

 

[bad]

Number 2 looks to me more like tambotie, but I am not positive. One way to tell is to smell the wood. Of the woods you listed that are in the box, tamobote and lignum are very aromatic. The easy way to tell between redheart and pink ivory is the weight. Pink ivory is much heavier. Lignum is also a heavier wood. It is supposed to sink in water as well (don't know if that holds true when it is covered in wax, though).

Thanks for the suggestions Craig. I'll take both samples to the saw and trim off the wax and see what they smell like. You obviously have a lot more experience and knowledge with these exotic woods than I do. I don't mind admitting that I've never even heard of most of these types of wood before.

I've just placed an order for a lot more pen kits with woodpenpro. There is always an extra week or two delay when ordering stuff from the U.S., but when they come in I'm gjoing to be cutting up those blanks and seeing how well they turn into pens. All except for the ebony. I've read on a couple of other threads how hard it is to turn and it's still prone to splitting. I think I'll save that for a segmented bowl or something.

 

[fafow]

Bruce,

I am FAR from an expert on wood, but I have used a fair amount of lignum and really like it. Back when I was married (like last year) my wife would take the shavings or cuttings and put them in a little sack and put that in one of her dresser drawers for the aroma. Lignum is the only wood that I usually do not put any finish on. If you do, then you can't smell it. It has so much oil in it that I just buff the bare wood and get a decent shine. However, that shine won't last a long time either. Lignum is so hard and oily that it has been used for a very long time for bearings in propeller shafts. It will also change color (usually to a yellow) when under a lot of heat, then when left in the sun will go back to its natural color (usually green).

One other thing with lignum (at least with what I have worked with) is that the grain is very interlocked. When turned round you will see a section on opposite sides where it looks like there are separate lines of grain. These alternate lines of grain will go in opposite directions. One layer could be a 45 degree angle to the right and the next layer or level would be a 45 degree angle to the left. It's really an interesting wood.

Tambote or tambootie (it has a lot of spellings) is not as aromatic, but definitely more than most. It is from Africa and I have read that it has been used in perfumes. I've only used it a few times but have a couple blocks of it at home.