Philippine Mahogany

[Tod Gilding]

I was just wondering if anyone has used a Timber in Luthiery Called Meranti ,Also Known as Lauan, Meranti, Pacific Maple, Philippine Mahogany, Seraya.

[DarwinStrings]

Not in guitar making but I have used a stack in joinery and second fix carpentry, why do you ask?

Jim

[Clancy]

Taken from John Calkin's "The Heretic's Guide to Alternative Lutherie Woods"

Meranti. Jeff Huss found a small supply of this Filipino mahogany at a bluegrass jam and has been searching for more ever since. Its' fiddleback figure looks wonderful. There is little to say about it since it is a mahogany. We ran out of meranti before I began building the bodies at H&D. I remember Mark breaking a fair number of sides trying to bend them into cutaways, but this was before we switched to spring steel slats in the bender

I've been checking out the supplies at the local Home Hardware.
Meranti & Radiata Pine seem to be the only available timbers here in Alice.
Yet to find anything worthwhile, but will keep looking.

[DarwinStrings]

I am surprised Craig that they sell it, I was told by Bunnies staff that they stopped selling Meranti and changed to Durian for conservation purposes, not sure about how much truth there is in that though. Another building timber supplier up here told me that all there Meranti is sustainable as they harvested responsibly by leaving large tracks of forest, (the bits of forest that have been strafed by machine gun fire during armed conflict rendering it too expensive to mill due to saw breakage) again who knows what the truth is . Meranti comes from about twenty or so different species of Shorea some is excellent some not so hot.

Jim

[Tod Gilding]

Sorry I was so long with the answer Jim but my computer died

I was asking because I am about to make my first Acoustic neck and thought I would practice on a bit of scrap first,had a suitable length of Meranti so started my practice session,but half way through I was looking at it and thinking that this could make a nice neck in it own right ,it seems to be strong enough and light enough,but I have never heard of anyone useing it ,so I thought I would ask.


Tod

[Puff]

A way forward; if in doubt - give it a go Can handle "That didn't work" but would hate to die wondering.
Since "meranti" or Phillipine mahogany etc is used to cover a deal of woods, most of which should have some value as tonewood, I would reckon it worth a try.

[Nick Payne]

There are quite a lot of different species that can be called meranti. It can vary from dark red through light red to almost yellow, and can also vary a fair bit in density and hardness. I used some light red meranti for some necks a long time ago, mainly because I had several nice well-seasoned planks of it to spare after building bookshelves, and the variety I had was pretty light and had a nice wavy stripy figure. I still have one of those guitars, and the neck is still perfectly straight after 35 years.

[Taffy Evans]

Yes I have used it on a number of instruments [years ago]: Dulcimers, Irish bouzouki, and I put a new back on an old Alvarez steel string. This was years ago when I was in the NT and it was plentiful in the local woodyard. Oh, and I remember using it on a Solid body guitar with a cap.

[Tod Gilding]

the variety I had was pretty light and had a nice wavy stripy figure

Yes Nick This Stuff I have is the same, I think my practice neck might just become THE NECK this meranti takes glue perfectly,is very light and very strong, has a nice figure, it also looks like it would take a stain well and around here is cheap as chips

[Clancy]

I had a hunt through all the Meranti yesterday.
Couldn't find anything large enough for guitars.
Grabbed a plain length with grain on the 1/4 for a couple of concert uke back & sides.
Thought I might dress them up a bit with bindings from these pieces I managed to find (& save from being wasted in a building).
Wish I could find the rest of the tree

Went and had a talk with the guys who do the milling.
(They just get the planks in & cut and shape them for skirting and the like)
The had some very figured wood, but it was all horrible, softer, fibrous stuff.
They called it something like Ganglang, Gangarin, Ganggajang??????????
I really don't remember and I really don't want any

[Dekka]

My eagle-eyed wife spotted a broken guitar out on the kerb-side collection pile a while back. It was an solid-topped Martinez with a snapped neck and a couple of other injuries. Anyway I eventually got around to making a new neck for it. It was my first crack at a dove-tail neck so I didn't want to invest heavily into something I was probably going to stuff up.
I laminated a blank out of three different scraps of Meranti and a bit of brush box I had lying around. Came out looking okay and so far seems stable enough.