Any one routed Sapele "mahogany"?

[mark84]

Thinking about picking some up for a project but I've heard its terrible for tear out, has any one here used it successfully?

I'd like to get away with using a normal upcut cutter and just climbing through it.

[Fivetide]

Yeah I use it, its fine I have it down to 5 mm walls on my MODS



It can wear out cutters if you over spin them, and when they do get blunt you will get like wool twists at the edge, I normally copy the first cut in the code and add it to the end sort of like a clean up pass.. works great.

[mark84]

Thanks for the reply, they look great :)
I really like the look of the wood-and the price!

[Fivetide]

Its a really stable wood even on thin pieces, but if you stain or oil any thin single part like the lids in my picture.. make sure cover all of it. It normally so dry after drying it will bow like a mother if you only do the face..

[mark84]

Its a really stable wood even on thin pieces, but if you stain or oil any thin single part like the lids in my picture.. make sure cover all of it. It normally so dry after drying it will bow like a mother if you only do the face..

If I use it i'll probably just polyurethane it. I still can't decide to behonest, lots of people out there seem to have issues with it!
I chanced across a thread you made actually, is your piece here sapele?

[Fivetide]

Yep, wow that's a few years ago now lol The thing with sapele is the uniform grain, as you can see on the piece above , how uniform it runs vertically and almost perfectly spaced. I've seen it quater cut and the gold striations look amazing. Its all about how much reward from effort with wood. Its hard to work with but it has excellent results :)