Hard wood planks

African mahogany by the looks of things.

It was among the most readily available imported hardwoods 20-30 years ago.

michael adams

...

I have some very similar looking, I bought from wickes at about that time, not mahogany (which I think was already frowned-on for sustainability back then) and was surprisingly cheap at the time, still not used it ...

I think it looks more like Meranti aka Philipine Mahogany. I'm pretty sure you have to go back 30-40 years before true Mahogany was common.

I think that looks like sepele as that is far more readily available than mahogany.

It has a Mahogany look to it, but I would expect its probably Sapele. (its quite often what you get when you buy generic "hardwood" window boards from a timber supplier).

It looks very good when polished up, getting a kind of slightly translucent shimmer effect to the grain that reflects differently depending on the angle of view/light. e.g.:

It darkens very nicely with bi/di chromate of potash. Bright orange powder that you mix with water.

Just out of curiosity I had a look on Ebay and Amazon to see if it was still available; but all the hits were for sulphate of potash, the fertiliser.

When I last bought some, they dished it out in white paper bags like sweets. As I still had some left in such a bag, probably gone solid by now, when I last happened to look few years ago.

michael adams

...

Suggest you consider the possibility it is utile.

So, am I right that it's definitely African Mahogany? Umm, Meranti? Umm, Sapele? Umm, Utile?

Hexavalent chromium is carcinogenic, which may account for its unavailability now.

Sapele. I'll go with that, too.

You could probably eliminate some of those by density and how it behaves when you try to carve some detail into it. Sapele would have been my other guess but I though the grain didn't look fine enough for that.

Most of the red coloured hardwoods do look pretty similar to mahogany since they are selected as mahogany substitutes - some have become so popular that they in turn are now endangered species in habitat.

One of those, yes. The slightly porous look just says 'sapele' to me, but I never did much with Meranti...

I'd go with Sapele also. Sapele was often offered as a substitute for mahogany years ago. We have sapele window frames which after 30 odd years are still perfect

They are all sold as Mahogany substitutes, and look similar.