MIMF

I've been on sawmill creek, where a guy has offered a 1"x25" x65" slab of osage orange for part of the cost of milling ($80).

Do you think it'd be a good idea to get it?
In terms of resawing, I was thinking of dropping by a local luthier supply house for the resawing...or going to a luthier friend with a ginormous bandsaw (and buying extra blades).

-Matt

ps. Alternatively, I can just buy a set.

Osage Orange is my favorite wood for sound. It is a bit hard to work but it bends easily. I prefer to get it quartersawn. It eats steel bandsaw blades quickly. I get good performance with carbide tipped blades, though.

Osage Orange has been discussed quite a few times here.
It is considered by many to be a dead ringer acoustically for Brazilian Rosewood, though obviously not visually.
do a search of the library, that's what it's there for, and I think we forget how much really valuable information is there.

Here's one of many of the discussions.
http://www.mimf.com/library/Osage_Orang ... -2011.html

So much is going to depend on the runout in the board. The tree's girth was certainly a once in a lifetime find.

Matthew Lau wrote:I've been on sawmill creek, where a guy has offered a 1"x25" x65" slab of osage orange for part of the cost of milling ($80).

Do you think it'd be a good idea to get it?
In terms of resawing, I was thinking of dropping by a local luthier supply house for the resawing...or going to a luthier friend with a ginormous bandsaw (and buying extra blades).

-Matt

ps. Alternatively, I can just buy a set.

Send me a couple chunks, and I'll send back resawn pieces and keep some for myself? I've never resawn or worked with it personally, but I think I've experienced already the very worst (silica infested) wood, so can't imagine a greater challenge. I'd love to have some Osage to work with for my own.

Have you seen the board yet? Osage with those dimensions is probably going to be flatsawn but probably near the middle of the tree. I might be pretty gnarly; finding large, clear boards of OO is somewhat rare compared to other trees. When I first saw the dimensions you posted, my mind started figuring out how many back and side sets you could get, then I realized it was not that simple.

nope. got swarmed by work.

now, coronovirus shutdown

A quick surf of the web shows a number of decent looking guitar sets in the $100 to $200 dollar range. Unless the "slab" looked really good I would be inclined to buy a set where I could see what I was getting.

I'm thinking it was cut for natural edge table top. That's the way he chose to cut it. I found several here in Atlanta but it had knots everywhere; no way to get what I needed for sides. I ended up trading with Bob above and it worked out fine.

A beautiful table top can still have knots and checks everywhere.

One other thing. Shipping on that slab could run about the cost of the wood.