Cuban Mahogany Question

[Dave Diaman]

Hey guys, I am in the process of moving my wood stash and figuring out what I need to keep and what needs to be thinned out. I am going to sell off some of my prized Cuban mahogany. The material I have isn’t the stuff that is harvested in Florida. What I have is material that has been in the country since before the Cuban Missile Crisis when it was still legal to import. It is the really dark dense stuff that will usually sink in water. I have always bought it in bulk or as part of an estate so I have no idea what the retail value will be if I piece it out. I have stuff from 4/4 all the way to 16/4. Some is curly some has a little quilt. Most of the heavily curly or quilted stuff I am keeping. My question is for you guys who have tried to track some down do you have any idea about the retail value in 5-10 Bf chunks?

[Admiral]

You might want to gauge the interest on a luthier's forum, as true pre-embargo stock is highly valued for guitars due to its dense nature which has something to do with sound reproduction. Depending on the grain, I would imagine you are talking minimum $20 bd/ft, but that's just a wild guess, perhaps more.

[Herb G]

Send me a chunk & I'll give you my opinion.

[rwe2156]

I've seen it go for up to $40/bf.
You've got a valuable stock of lumber there.

[Dave Diaman]

Yeah, I know it is pretty valuable. I have about 2000 bf in total. I have a few boards that are 40" wide and quite a few 12/4 boards that are 25" wide for Bombe' pieces. I also have quite a bit with heavy quilt or curl. The big and figured stuff I am keeping because it is so hard to replace. Some of the shorter pieces that can me shipped I am going to thin just because I need to reduce the amount of wood I am storing. I have room for probably 6000 Bf at my new shop and need to make the bulk of that wood that I use the most. Mainly tiger maple and figured cherry. Walnut seems to be coming back right now too but mahogany furniture is not a big seller right now. I'm sure it will come back around though and I will be ready when it does. here are a few shots of some of it.

[Mr Eddie]

Those three little boards on the front end loader would work. When can I stop by?

Lonnie

[arw01]

Looks just like the Cuban I brought home from Hawaii last year, meant to buy some more there but boneheaded it when I saw the tiger curl koa I packed home.

I would like a couple three shorts in the about 1' wide and a couple feet long when you get that far, always wanted to make a very nice box and don't have enough material.

Alan

[DaveinOhio]

Quite the $ta$h, sir!

Dave

[clockman]

really beautiful!

[AHill]

I wonder how long it'll be before trade with Cuba is allowed, given we have now opened an embassy there? Sell it soon, because if they open up the floodgates for trade, the price will certainly go down.

In this link, an entire flitch of Cuban mahogany that was grown in Key Largo went for anywhere from $14-68 per BF. All the boards were milled to 4/4 or 8/4 and most were more than 10' long.

http://www.woodshop102.com/29.html