Identify the neck wood

Caffeine_Vampire

WezV

Mahogany

HilditchGuitars

hmmm Mahogany or Iroko.

TJT1979

Cedrela (aka Spanish Cedar). I'm pretty sure it's that... all the doors in my house are made from it, plus the neck and back/sides of my acoustic. Very nice for guitars... light and stiff. Looks similar to Mahogany but often slightly more open-grained. Kauer use it a lot, and Bailey guitars in the UK as well. It's fairly well-known in classical guitars but not used in electrics much.

Kalimna

Certainly looks to be a mahogany type wood. But it is quite red, and I have some padauk that is quite simillar.
Is it reclaimed?
Which end of the density scale is it?
Does it have a smell when machined?

ICBM

I agree with TJT1979 - the colour looks too orange for mahogany and there is some fine dappling that looks like iroko, but the dark grain lines don’t look like it. It does look most like Cedrela.

It’s very hard to tell though. Wood can vary so much even within one species, let alone between two varieties of something like ‘mahogany’, that it can sometimes be impossible to be sure.

WezV

Mahogany and iroko are often confused when finished, but iroko stands out as soon as you take the finish off.   If anyone wants some big   iroko boards feel free to come get it after lockdown

I'm assuming this is stripped from a factory guitar too, but some context would definitely help with the identification.  

Spanish cedar/cedrela can certainly look similar

I'm sticking with mahogany. If asked to be more specific I would go with one of the genuine mahogany family.  I spent Monday and Tuesday cutting up some old stock mahogany boards I believe to be Honduran (context helps, that's what was available to my source at the time) and that grain is what I was looking at.  The deep pores, pale grain lines and very tiny chatayoncy when you look closely

Kalimna

Its also not unlike redheart/chakte kok. Not quite red enough perhaps.

Caffeine_Vampire

More pics. For context, this my 1991 LP Studio. I’m taking it back to the wood to refin.  Everything so far has agreed with my research on this model year but the neck confused me. I was expecting eastern hard rock maple and got what I thought was mahogany but I’m no longer convinced of that. Im certainly no expert so it’s up for debate. 

Kalimna

What does it smell like when you sand it?

WezV

That seals it, it's definitely mahogany.

Here is a piece of the Honduran I was carving on Tuesday.

https://i.imgur.com/Tori9Hs.jpg

It's flat sawn, and your neck is closer to quartered... But same features other than that.   A pale reddish brown colour of freshly uncovered mahogany that will darken up quite quickly

Pale creamy winter grain lines, very subtle due to a relatively consistent growing climate, white mineral flecks in the pores.  My pic doesn't capture the very subtle chatayoncy you see close up, but it's there(edit.. actually quite clear if you zoom in).  Yours has more black in the grain, but it's been finished black.

Caffeine_Vampire

@Kalimna Like my sinuses are blocked unfortunately.

Kalimna

Caffeine_Vampire said:

@Kalimna Like my sinuses are blocked unfortunately.

Fair enough - sounds like a daft question, but can sometimes help differentiating between simillar looking species. Cedrella has a distinctive smell quite different to mahogany.
Purpleheart, to me, smells of candy floss.
Bubinga, of musty earth/cow poo.
Rosewood is supposed to give off a rose aroma - hence the name.
Maple can smell a little of burnt sugar if sanded.

Adam

Caffeine_Vampire

@Kalimna Thanks Adam, I wasn’t being dismissive. I might as well have corks in my nostrils atm but I’ve bookmarked your post for future reference. Sincere thanks. 

Kalimna

Caffeine_Vampire said:

@Kalimna Thanks Adam, I wasn’t being dismissive. I might as well have corks in my nostrils atm but I’ve bookmarked your post for future reference. Sincere thanks. 

I didnt take it as dismissive at all
Take care, hope the sinuses improve!

ICBM

Yes, when you see it with better lighting it's clearly mahogany.

Caffeine_Vampire

Yep, agreed. It threw me for a moment there though. Got to admit, I didn’t peak under the truss rod cover as I was hoping for maple but no big deal I guess. @WezV Thats a lovely looking piece of wood you have there. 

Rabs

I was gonna say Utile..  But if its a Gibson LP Studio then its definitely mahogany..  Probably South American. Im not sure they use any other type (well not back then anyway). I am sure I have seen them use Sapele in the last decade or so but that's not Sapele..