Boat from rosewood

[Deni Irawan]

Hi everyone,

There will be a new Dam ( water resource ) not far from where i'm living now,and i am going to build a small boat ofcause,
As rosewood trees are growing a lot here at my area, i was wondering if anyone here could help me, is the rosewood good enough for boat making ?

Thanks,

[Leo Voisine]

WOW - I dunno about building a boat out of that.

My guess is that is extremely heavy wood.

It sure is beautiful.

I am positive it would make a gorgeous coffee table in my home.

Wish there was a way to cut a deal and ship it here.

Leo

[Brian Kent]

Sure, just sell it to us, ship it over, and buy a boat.:D

[Brett Baldwin]

It sure would be a beautiful boat.

My first thought is that the wood is very dense so you would have to plan for a heavy boat. I believe that would mean that the sides would have to be taller than average because your draft would be deeper. Also, sometimes these woods are very hard and brittle. How well will it bend to fit the shape of the boat? I suppose that depends mostly on the desgin of the boat.

Next, I'm thinking about the finish that will be put on it. Is that wood an oily one? There would be some extra steps to prepping it for finish if that's the case.

I know it is possible to do but it may not be easy. If there isn't any rush to the project, maybe you could make a small scale model and see how well that works before you put too much time and wood into a full size one.

[Todd Burch]

Is it good enough for boat building.... SMARTY PANTS!! SHOW OFF!!

[Todd Burch]

Those look like they were cut with 3 different kids of saws. How were they cut?

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Why not harvest all that lumber you can and auction it off to US purchasers?
You would be able to sell it by the Container load and rather quickly I should think.

[Deni Irawan]

Is it good enough for boat building.... SMARTY PANTS!! SHOW OFF!!

Thanks for all comments,
i am just a small guy from the villages,i use those wood for musical instruments use and sometimes for furniture,
and Todd, i did not mean to show off, i just want to get others thought from others woodworkers who realy wanna share what they knew, isnt it what the forums for,,,no ? i realy dont know anything about boat building,
and all i have is rosewood, here check this out :
http://picasaweb.google.com/deniirawan66 (http://picasaweb.google.com/deniirawan66)



Cheers,

[Brian Kent]

Deni,

Thanks for that link and the beautiful pictures. On my side of the pacific I only see small pieces of rosewood at huge prices. Our cocobolo from Mexico is $22 per board foot, and nothing beyond 3 feet long.

Your Rosewood sources and creations are outstanding.

Have you done any work on the boat yet? Maybe somebody on this forum could point you to plans than can handle such a heavy wood. How many people would the boat hold, and would it be powered or rowed?

Brian Kent

[Deni Irawan]

Deni,

Thanks for that link and the beautiful pictures. On my side of the pacific I only see small pieces of rosewood at huge prices. Our cocobolo from Mexico is $22 per board foot, and nothing beyond 3 feet long.

Your Rosewood sources and creations are outstanding.

Have you done any work on the boat yet? Maybe somebody on this forum could point you to plans than can handle such a heavy wood. How many people would the boat hold, and would it be powered or rowed?

Brian Kent


Hi Brian,

$ 22/bdf ? wow,,,the woodworkers there must be all rich then,
its rainy season here now, not much thing i can do, and building boat need more shade space i think, and i have been busy with wooden scooter project lately, i have already the plans of various type of boat, my idea is to rent the powered boat for 5 ppl to some tourist, as the dam is gonna be the biggest dam in asia ''JATI GEDE DAM'' and i want to make it from rosewood as i know its long lasting wood,but i duno about wood in water, i came here to learn from fellow woodworkers.

Thanks,

[Brett Baldwin]

At $22/bdft we don't even think about making boats out of rosewood. ;)
We use rosewood like yours for accents on bigger pieces or for special small projects mostly. I looked at your Picasa gallery and that is an amazing cache of wood you show. I live in the desert so you can imagine how few trees we have here. Only very small ones that are more like big bushes or the non-native ones that are part of a house's landscaping.

There is a guy, Jim King, that lives in Iquitos, Peru that posts here. He posted about a boat made out of Purpleheart, which is another very dense wood. It might be interesting for you.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=79795&highlight=purpleheart

[Deni Irawan]

At $22/bdft we don't even think about making boats out of rosewood. ;)
We use rosewood like yours for accents on bigger pieces or for special small projects mostly. I looked at your Picasa gallery and that is an amazing cache of wood you show. I live in the desert so you can imagine how few trees we have here. Only very small ones that are more like big bushes or the non-native ones that are part of a house's landscaping.

There is a guy, Jim King, that lives in Iquitos, Peru that posts here. He posted about a boat made out of Purpleheart, which is another very dense wood. It might be interesting for you.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=79795&highlight=purpleheart



thanks for the link Brett,
that's great boat from great wood,i will ask his opinion,
i see rosewood every day or maybe every minute, if you see my wooden house and furniture are made from rosewood as well, but there is always more at others place and less at the others (hope you'll understand my english ), we can not have it all,
that's why we need to share here,

Cheers,

[Brian Kent]

Hi Brian,

$ 22/bdf ? wow,,,the woodworkers there must be all rich then,
its rainy season here now, not much thing i can do, and building boat need more shade space i think, and i have been busy with wooden scooter project lately, i have already the plans of various type of boat, my idea is to rent the powered boat for 5 ppl to some tourist, as the dam is gonna be the biggest dam in asia ''JATI GEDE DAM'' and i want to make it from rosewood as i know its long lasting wood,but i duno about wood in water, i came here to learn from fellow woodworkers.

Thanks,

We're not that rich. We just don't use much rosewood. Usually just for tool handles or small box trim.

I am a boat lover but not a boat builder. When I picture a boat in heavy wood, I think it needs built-in flotation compartments so that if the boat gets swamped it still will float level and keep the scared passengers safe and secure. The "Boston Whaler" boats do this with closed-cell foam.

As long as the boat is built with tried and true plans, and with extra large flotation compartments, I think a rosewood boat would be a great tourist attraction in itself.

Brian

[Herbert Wallace]

If I were building a boat of rosewood, I would consider building in the cedar strip style. Cutting thin strips and laying them up on a form in the shape boat you want. Then fiberglassing the whole thing inside and out. This would make a much lighter boat, and you could use shorter strips butted together. This would allow tou to use shorter lumber. Do a search for strip built boats. There are many designs to choose from. The rosewood would certainly make a beautiful strip boat.
Hope this helps,
Herbert

[Allan Froehlich]

Deni,

Do you have mahogany trees in your area?
That might be your wood of choice for boat building.

[dan grant]

Thanks for all comments,
i am just a small guy from the villages,i use those wood for musical instruments use and sometimes for furniture,
and Todd, i did not mean to show off, i just want to get others thought from others woodworkers who realy wanna share what they knew, isnt it what the forums for,,,no ? i realy dont know anything about boat building,
and all i have is rosewood, here check this out :
http://picasaweb.google.com/deniirawan66 (http://picasaweb.google.com/deniirawan66)



Cheers,i think paul was just pulling your leg deni, nice lumber, we pay 52$bf for cocobolo here in sunny saskatchewan where it is our rainy season also just frozen stuff though

[Deni Irawan]

Now i found myself realy comportable being a member of SCW,
lots good guys here,

Thanks for all suggestion,

Cheers,

[Mike OMelia]

Hi Deni,

This appears to be you: http://www.alibaba.com/member/id100560815/aboutus.html

Is it? Nice stuff!

Mike

[Deni Irawan]

Hi Deni,

This appears to be you: http://www.alibaba.com/member/id100560815/aboutus.html

Is it? Nice stuff!

Mike

Ya Mike, that's mine but the site is still under construction,

[randy street]

Deni,

What part of Indonesia are you from? I just got back from a trip to Jakarta and Bali.

Randy

[Deni Irawan]

Deni,

What part of Indonesia are you from? I just got back from a trip to Jakarta and Bali.

Randy

Hi Randy,

next time you come over here, let me know.
i am living two hour drive from jakarta, its Bandung, west java,

Cheers,

[scott spencer]

That sure is pretty wood! Rosewood can be expensive to buy here, so it's kind of novelty to see such large beautiful pieces of it. Be sure to post some pics if you do build a boat from it!

[Terry Rogan]

For boat building, you want to avoid really dense woods such as Rosewood, although sign me up if someone wants to import the stuff. I've got some woodworking projects I'd like to do out of Rosewood.
But back to boats...

It's not so much the weight that's the problem (although it is a consideration). The problem has to do with expansion and contraction of the wood.
If you use a dense wood, movement as a result of expansion and contraction over time will result in cracking and separating of the joints.
But a soft wood such as Western Red Cedar or Mahogany will expand and contract into itself (compress itself) thus avoiding the huge stresses on the seams.

So no, Rosewood wouldn't be a very good wood for boatbuilding.
But I'd sure like to talk about getting a couple hundred board feet of it if it could be brought in to the states at a reasonable price.