Mahogany inheritance

Headphones

I have a socking great lump of mahogany.  It's come from my late father's wood pile and was overlooked when we sold off the pile to his former trade friends (he was a boat builder).

It's something like three to four inches deep and about three foot by four foot in size.  It appears to be a dark, fairly dense mahogany (not sure which species) and will have been in the pile since at least the late eighties - so it's well seasoned!

It seems to scream "guitar" - but I'm no luthier, so I need to hatch an affordable plan with someone who is.

Can any one offer a recommendation?  Ideally within striking distance of Brizzle.

Deadman

I can't but that sounds exciting. A potentially fitting tribute to your Dad too no doubt. Good luck with it.

octatonic

Do you want someone to build you a guitar with that wood?
Handmade guitar and affordable don't really go together unless you are doing the work yourself.

Sounds like a nice tribute to him though.
Good luck with your project.

WezV

weight would be the deciding factor for me. 

although there would also be consideration about how to actually get it to usable sizes and how much of it is waste.

the first step would be to resaw it, and it needs a big saw. 

If going for 1 piece bodies it needs slicing into  in half to give two pieces 1  1/2' wide.  each of those would then need sawing to half the thickness giving 4 planks at 1.5-1.75"x 1.5'x4'.  That's 8 one piece bodies and a lot of waste.  With careful wood placement you could probably squeeze 4 more  2-piece bodies out of the offcuts

The other option is to go for 2-piece bodies. The first step would be to saw it into 7" strips,  should get 5 of them pus a bit extra, then  repeat the steps above.    resawing to these sizes is much easier than the option above, but go somewhere with a big enough saw and experience of hardwoods and either should be possible.

The wood is much more valuable once its been sawn and planed/sanded to usable dimensions, but that all depends on quality.

earwighoney

Headphones said:

I have a socking great lump of mahogany.  It's come from my late father's wood pile and was overlooked when we sold off the pile to his former trade friends (he was a boat builder).

It's something like three to four inches deep and about three foot by four foot in size.  It appears to be a dark, fairly dense mahogany (not sure which species) and will have been in the pile since at least the late eighties - so it's well seasoned!

It seems to scream "guitar" - but I'm no luthier, so I need to hatch an affordable plan with someone who is.

Can any one offer a recommendation?  Ideally within striking distance of Brizzle.

Not an electric builder, but I'd recommend taking the wood to Jon Kinkade who's in Bristol who makes some very nice acoustic guitars. 
http://www.kinkadeguitars.co.uk