Old timers, what woods were used when you started?

Greenberg Woods

Greenberg Woods

Joined
Dec 27, 2013
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Hey guys. I was having a chat with some makers about the woods they used to see for knives and the current market.

It's always a little odd to remind myself that despite still being a little young "I'm currently 26" I've been in the knife making world for about 13 years and selling wood for 10-11 years. I was starting knifemaking around when shows like forged in fire, Alecs videos and Walter Sorrells videos were coming out and knifemaking was becoming a more common hobby.

Looking back, when guys like Burlsource were the main wood sellers the species range seemed much smaller. Lots of domestic hardwoods, maple burl, curly maple, walnut, Osage orange, curly Koa amd Desert ironwood. The exotic species being used were the more common ones, ebony, African Blackwood, some amboyna, purpleheart, cocobolo and some rosewood.

For those of you who have been doing this a while, what woods do you remember being common? How much has the wood landscape changed?
 
not that i have been doing this for what i woudl call a long time but when i was starting out most of what was seen was domestic woods with quilt, curl or burl. cocobolo was also a std. but thats now become less available. exotics were around but were $$ option where as today while not cheap have become much more available
 
cocobolo used to be very common, Blackwood/Ebony mostly on Bowie styles.. Desert Ironwood/Koa/Amboyna/Osage kinda here and there ..
Kingwood ,Thuya ,Snakewood.. certain makers had favorite woods they liked to use.. i liked the dyed stabilized maple burls from (Uncle Frank)
curious to see more replies
 
15 years ago everything was about burl, now it is about stripes like curly maple, narra, mango etc
 
It is interesting to see the changes I must say. Everyone talks about how the price/ quality of koa is a worse and worse ratio over time as the good stuff is harder and more expensive to get.

Snakewood is always a very strange wood to me as a wood seller. Its expensive, but not rare.

If you wanted 200 pounds of top quality HRB or ebony burl or curly rosewood, it would be difficult to source. Its not ready and available on the wholesale market, it would be a hunt and eventually if you found it it would be expensive.

Snakewood is odd because I could buy 500 pounds today or 500 pounds next week, its super expensive but quite available and easy to source if you are willing to.
 
In the 1960's and 70's it was whatever was around. Mostly walnut, plain maple, bone, and stag. Back then there was no such thing as a knife wood/handle/parts/tools supplier.
In the 80's cocobolo became popular, and never really has stopped being a good seller.
By the 90's it was burl-burl-burl! I would purchase huge slabs of buckeye and redwood burl and process them into handle blocks. Desert Ironwood started to be a good seller.
Buy the early 2000's, it was curly maple, quilted maple, and other highly figured woods like koa and desert ironwood.
Around that time synthetics like Micarta, G-10, and the acrylics (I hate those) started being valid alternatives to wood.
 
Cocbolo's so pretty and didn't work for me for long - that sensitizing reaction is permanent. There's still a board of it in my storage area.

I loved Para-kingwood. Those kinda deep magenta colors are wonderful.

Curly maple - the lightest knives I ever made were stick tang with unstabilized curly maple. Stain it with brown liquid shoe polish and soak it in danish oil and it is stable as can be and beautiful. One of my first forged blades sits downstairs, ca 1987, beat up from years in the field, but that wood hasn't changed and you can't nick the plate bolster with a nail. Not to mention, it's the wood oof choice for wire inlay. Love maple.

Blackwood, Macassar ebony, kingwood were others I favored.
 
Interesting. When I was just starting out ironwood burl was popular, and some exotics like gidgee and Amboyna were available in limited quantities.

Cocobolo was the wood that built Greenberg woods. I spent $2000 of my bar mitzvah money on several big billets of cocobolo and milled them down.

It's always funny to me when people say walnut or maple or hickory won't work for a handle though.

Sorry if this post isn't very useful, just been thinking about the state of the industry when I first joined.
 
Greenberg Woods said:
It's always funny to me when people say walnut or maple or hickory won't work for a handle though.
Click to expand...
I think that between stainless steels and plastic handles a lot of people have got the idea that knives require no care. Personally i quite like the idea of a natural wooden handle that will rot when I'm done with it, even if that means i can't soak it in the sink for hours
 
curly and flame birch has been around a long time and always will be, I seem to remember alder root burl being sought after as well.
 
I cant help but ask this here. While I have been building my shop, I also have been collecting Turkish Walnut Root Burl blocks; They are, in my opinion, the most beautiful wood that I have ever seen.

I do not see them on knives much unless I specifically seek them out. They seem priced in the neighborhood of other woods, Is it difficult to work or maintain?
 
Funny that you mention Turkish Walnut root burl. I have a large slab on its way to me. I will check the moisture content and dry it until it is ready for stabilizing. It is indeed a lovely wood. I think it is not well known because it isn't readily available in large quantity and in grades suitable for knife handles. It is also a bit pricy in good grade.
 
So, apparently I may not have a steady supply of this, as I had believed.
It seems I may have to go in the manner as you Stacey and source slabs to process.
Could you please explain how I should determine the moisture and go about drying the wood for stabilizing?
 
Moisture meter.
Dry slowly with good ventilation.
Check every few months.
Send to stabilizer when below 10%

Normally, when I get the boards, I sand the wood on all sides and test the moisture. If it is very high, I paint the ends and dry for at least a year.
Then I cut it into blocks or shorter boards and let them dry a couple months. I test them again and send them off when they are below 10%.

If you plan on drying wood often, making a drying cabinet from a metal box or storage cabinet and a 100-watt bulb is a great idea.
 
When it comes, I will try and post a thread on drying and cutting wood.

I also have some large 8"X8"X4" black palm blocks coming. All my old suppliers don't have it in the planks I used to get. They probably cut it up for wood turning and pens now. I used to get slabs around 1.5-2"X5-6"X36-48". Now everyone has it in 2X2X12" turning squares.
 
I used a fair bit of Mahogany, Cherry, and Walnut for the few knives I made in the 2000s. Cherry was a personal favorite.
 
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