Wood

[Bernie Weishapl]

I have a chance to pick up some Ambrosia Maple. I have never heard of it. Can someone tell me what kind of maple it is and what is the wood like? The guy said most of the wood was 3 1/2" to 4" thick X 9" X 48" to 50". He said he wants .75 a board ft. Also what is Red Elm like to work with? He said he would sell me some of that for the same price. He said that would be 4" X 10" to 12" X 60" or so. Any help would be appreciated.

[Doug Shepard]

I've only seen a few pics of Ambrosia maple. I tend to think it's more a description of the figure rather than a specific species. I cant recall for sure, but I think the figure in the pics I've seen was along the lines of quilted maple except the mottled pattern was really small. Hope my memory isn't failing and I'm mixing it up with something else. Regardless - at 75 cents a BF - who cares what kind of maple it is. Buy it!

[Dan Forman]

Ambrosia maple is a maple which has been invaded by the ambrosia beetle. The beetle introduces two types of fungi to the tree, one of which is eaten by the beetle, the other causes a staining of the wood similar to spalting.

Here is a link to a dining room set made from AM (not by me).

http://www.blueridgewoodworkers.com/ambrosia_maple_dining_set.html

This and more info is available by googling "ambrosia maple"

I would jump on the maple by the way.

Red elm is also known as slippery elm. Can be found on the page below.

http://www.woodbin.com/ref/wood/index.htm

Dan

[Doug Shepard]

Bernie
Out of curiosity I went on eBay and searched 'ambrosia maple' after my earlier post. There's quite a few pcs up for bid with pics that the sellers are calling ambrosia maple. None of them look like what I was remembering and there's enough variation among the offerings to defy categorization. Quite a bit of it looks like 'spalted Lite', others are a mix of red/white tones. Some have a feint quilting pattern. I give up, but still think 75 cents a BF is a great price for maple of that thickness.

[Scott Parks]

Hey, Bernie,
Bring some on over to Denver:D Just kidding. I'll be paying $2.75 locally for Ambrosia Maple, so .75 is a good deal.

[Andy Hoyt]

AM is a true pleasure to turn. So's the elm, sort of.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Thanks for the info. I am going to take a look at it. If it is as good looking as that table it will be awesome. I kinda figured you couldn't go to wrong at .75 a board ft. It will have to be resawed but then again that will give me a chance to try the new grizzly out.:) Thanks again.