Best supplier for sapele

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Building a dining room table for my middle daughter and SIL. They've picked sapele for the top so I need to find a supplier for 8/4 x 96" stock.

Anyplace you'd recommend?

Thanks
Cliff

[Kevin Jenness]

David Sochar is in Indiana and can probably steer you in the right direction. If he doesn't chime in here, this is his website https://www.acornwoodworks.com/get-in-touch or you can pm him here.

[John K Jordan]

Have no idea about "best" but if you have trouble finding it you might try World Timbers: https://www.worldtimbercorp.com/exotic-woods/
I know people who buy quantities of a variety of wood from them. Might be a bit of a drive...

[Bill Carey]

I've been happy with every purchase I've made from Owl Hardwoods. They have 3 stores in the Chi area, one in Oak Lawn. Bit of a drive but a great store. 8/4 might be a hard get.

[Alan Lightstone]

I get mine from Weiss Hardwoods down here. Been real happy with them. But that's nowhere near you.

[roger wiegand]

Highland Hardwoods in NH has it by the container load. Beautiful stuff. I've seen 20/4 boards two feet wide and 16 ft long there. I've bought some from the shorts pile for making shallow bowls and platters on the lathe. They will ship anywhere, but I imagine you can find a closer source.

[Ken Ketcham]

Try L.L. Johnson Lumber in Charlotte, Michigan. They'll deliver to Fort Wayne. I've always had excellent service from them.

[Brian Tymchak]

May be a bit of a drive - CR Muterspaw Lumber in Xenia, OH was mentioned by a fellow Creeker as a good source for Exotics. He bought Honduran Mahagony from them. They show on their website they have sapele. Disclaimer - I've not done business with them, but I've heard more than 1 recommendation for them.

[Robert London]

Hey Cliff, try Facebook Marketplace. There's a lot of wood at local sawmills and independents that don't have a brick and mortar store. I browse FB all the time and surprised to see all the wood I can by within an hours drive.

My local Klingspore store had a very good selection. Although 8/4 Sapele is more challenging to find.

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Try L.L. Johnson Lumber in Charlotte, Michigan. They'll deliver to Fort Wayne. I've always had excellent service from them.

They're just under 2 hours north. I called them and they have 8/4 in 16' lengths for 8.28 bf.
If possible I like to pick out my boards rather than hope for the best from someone else's choice. They're close enough for a day trip.

Cliff

[Cliff Polubinsky]

Drove up to L. L. Johnson yesterday. Thanks for the recommendation. They were easy to deal with and had a roomful of stock. Came back with 8/4 sapele, 1 - 17'x16", 1 - 17'x15" and 1 - 16'x7". Just over 100 bf which dropped the price from 8.28/bf to 6.35/bf. They cut them in half for me so I could get them into the back of the truck.

Sapele_long.jpg
Sapele_short.jpg

My SIL is taking 60 bf for his table top and I took the rest to have some stock.

Cliff

[Jim Becker]

That's a nice lot you picked up. I really like Sapele and am glad I still have some inventory of what I picked up from Chris Vickers a couple years ago. I'm mostly using it in guitar projects, but it's a great choice for many kinds of things. The price you got was also good and a great reason to stock up since the difference for 100 bd ft was so significant.

[Brian Tymchak]

That's quite the discount for a 100 bf bundle. I only usually find 10%. Nice haul! That's a good looking bundle.

Haven't priced sapele before. Surprised at how reasonable it is. Think I might put some on the racks.