Opinions Needed - Do you guys like this wood?

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Burl Source

Burl Source

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Another forum member in Australia and I have been trading boxes of wood. He sends me some cool Australian wood and I send him some of mine from Oregon. We have traded back and forth enough that he now has a lifetime supply so we probably won't do the trades much more in the future. He offered to hook me up with a fellow in Australia who harvests these woods if I wanted to start importing some of the cooler Australian knife handle woods.

This photo shows a few of the types of wood I am considering. These pieces came in the last box I received. They are all good hard woods that should not need to be stabilized. They will be kind of spendy though. Similar to a good grade of ironwood.

My questions to the forum members.
Is this something you would like to use on your knives?
Which do you like best?

The top block is Tasmanian Tiger Myrtle. Not much in the way of figure but cool color patterns. Hardness like rock maple.

The middle block is Ringed Gidgee with exceptional figure. Hard as Ironwood. A desert Acacia. Sometimes slightly denser than Ironwood.

The bottom block is Tasmanian Blackwood with very good figure. Probably the most reflective figure I have ever seen. Hardness like rock maple.

What do you think, should I get more of this stuff or stick with what I have here in Oregon?

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Tasmanian Tiger Myrtle and the Ringed Gidgee are cool.
The other looks too ordinary for a knifehandle.
 
Frank Barron said:
Tasmanian Tiger Myrtle and the Ringed Gidgee are cool.
The other looks too ordinary for a knifehandle.
Click to expand...

This is why I am asking you guys. I thought the blackwood was some of the coolest stuff. If you put it next to a piece of tigereye stone, I bet the blackwood would reflect the light and move around more than the tigereye. Maybe it's just my bad photography.
 
I really like the 2nd and 3rd ones. The top one I think would look good as bolster pieces next to other wood.
 
wet it with Methyl Hydrate to bring out the grain and shine right before you shoot the pic. (the wood will not crack if you use alkyhol.)
 
I like the bottom 2 personally, but how pricey is pricey? If you have to sell it a such a high price it may not be worth getting because the high price may scare off buyers and you would be stuck sitting on it. you also don't want to sell it at such a low price that you would lose money on it.
 
I have heard of ringed gindgee but had never seen it before, its not bad. I like the tiger myrtle the best although the bottom piece has a shine like it was stabilized. I owuld probably use these for very specific pieces.
 
I think all 3 would make excellent looking handles. Small tight patterns in wood makes a much more attractive handle. Lots of excellent curl in the two bottom pieces.
 
I actually really like that tasmanian blackwood on the bottom.:thumbup:
 
Burl Source said:
They are all good hard woods that should not need to be stabilized. They will be kind of spendy though. Similar to a good grade of ironwood.

The top block is Tasmanian Tiger Myrtle. Not much in the way of figure but cool color patterns. Hardness like rock maple.

The bottom block is Tasmanian Blackwood with very good figure. Probably the most reflective figure I have ever seen. Hardness like rock maple.
Click to expand...

To the experienced user, increased hardness thru acrylic infusion (AKA "stabilizing"..done properly...is certainly not the only reason the process is done. This physical property should NEVER be the single guiding criteria of whether a piece of wood benefits from proper "stabilizing" or not.

Tiger myrtle is NOT similar in density to rock maple. It is in fact much softer and I acrylic infuse it for some Australian luthiers so they can use it for fingerboards otherwise it's to soft. A knife maker at the OKCA show just got a big slab of Tazzie myrtle for cheap cost shipped direct from Oz and he asked me to acrylic infuse it for him for a share which I jumped on because I love this wood.

The Taz blackwood is an Acacia very similar to Koa..nearly identical and is similar to Koa in hardness..not rock maple at all. Taz or AKA Australian blackwood is a dead drop in for more expensive koa. Very plentiful and cheap in cut off pieces like knife sizes. Last time I bought Aussie blackwood lumber I paid $6.00 a board foot for 8/4 stock and some of it curly but that was a couple years ago.
 
My comparison of the hardness of the myrtle and blackwood were based on my cutting and sanding of these specific pieces. I compared this to some eastern rock maple I had on hand and made my comparison based on that.

I may be ignorant as to the common properties of imported woods. With the local woods I use I regularly see a wide range of variance with wood's hardness and density with redwood, maple, walnut and myrtle. An example would be some of the redwood burl I have on hand. One piece can be twice as heavy as another same sized piece. Probably something to do with the growth rates, growing conditions (desert or similar) stuff like that.

I guess just like some of the figure, colors and grain patterns I see in some of the wood, you could say "This type of wood is not supposed to be like that.

I just weighed one of the blocks I received in this batch of a wood he called Belah. 5&1/2" long and about 1&1/2" squared weighed over 1/2 pound. My guess would be that this guy is collecting his wood in a semi desert area.

I don't really know or care if the hardness of these pieces is normal for these woods. My only care is that they are real hard and I think they look real cool.

As for being able to get the wood cheap, you can get any wood cheap if you are willing to take left over junk stuff.

Just to make sure that I was not too far off base I did a search on the internet for specific hardness info.
Here is what I was able to find:
Eastern Hard Maple or Sugar Maple has a Janka Hardness rating of 1450 while Hawiian Koa was slightly less at 1220.
I was unable to find Janka ratings on the AU Blackwood or Myrtle but Australian ratings were 5.9 for both. Based on what I found, Larry is right. These woods under normal conditions would be slightly less hard than the Hard Maple.
 
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Ringed Gidgee & Tasmanian Blackwood look great, to me. My only issue is that I'd prefer to have larger pieces, as I want to be able to pick and choose where I'd like the grain to lay in relation to the flow of the knife. With a block, I'm pretty restricted. Is it unheard of to sell 2"x8"x12"(-or even 18" or longer) pieces?

Hope this isn't an internet scuffle, guys... sometimes things just come out wrong. Maybe you should take this to PM.
 
They all have potential, like the 3rd the best, 2nd then 1st. Not sure if I would pay much for them though.
 
I've been looking to get my hands on some of that acacia. I don't like paying the prices for good koa. I the melanoxylon looks as good as koa, I'd be interested. For me, the fact that koa is from Hawaii isn't very important. The chatoyancy is what's important.
 
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