[230] MAHOGANY
Posted: jueves, 8 de septiembre de 2011 by Superhero!! in
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During the last two weeks I have been working on a Trestle Table. A proffesional woodworker would say that this is a medium size project, but I'm just a hobbyist woodworker, for me it's a huge project and I'm taking my time to work with no hurry. The trestle table will be finished next week, so I hope to write a post about it soon. As usually, I'm using local Mahogany wood.
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I live in Quintana Roo -that is at southeastern's Mexico. In this area we have acces to a lot of tropical and exotic wood: Ziricote, Chakte-viga, Katalox, Dzalam, Machiche, Sapodilla, Chechen, Granadillo, Jabin, and the list can go on and on... However, the most used and most popular is Mahogany wood.
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I know that the name mahogany is used when referring to numerous varieties. To be honest, I always slept during my biology class. I don't have any idea about wich varieties of mahogany trees are growing in my area. I only know that people call it "Mahogany".
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Couple of days ago we had the visit of our Governor here at the instalations of the Ministry of Education - I have my office job there-. There was a meeting in which the Governor made the symbolic delivery of furniture to public schools. He told us that this is a special project to create local jobs, to exploit our natural resources and obviously to provide quality furniture to public schools. He noted that only local companies were contracted.
The message was that the money stays at home and that all benefits are for our community..
He told us that 3,500 pieces of furniture were made with mahogany wood. Dimensions and spec were provided by the Ministery of Education to ensure durability and comfort to students. This was a total investment around 6 million pesos ($480,000 USD). He also noted that he was very pleased with this project, so that authorized another $480,000 USD to build another 3,500 pieces of furniture in the coming months.
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When the meeting ended, I was glad to have a chance to inspect the pieces of furniture. I like the polyurethane finish, It looks nice but I'm afraid that teenager students can be tempted to register their marks on those nice wooden surfaces. I hope that these nice student chairs will find a careful owner .
Student chairs
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In general, I think the design of these furniture is austere. There is no ornamentation, and I think that's fine. School furniture doesn't need to be more expensive because ornamentation, but should be strong and sturdy because they are likely to be abused.
There is no plywood on these furniture. All panels are solid mahogany wood.
Teacher desks
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Bookshelves
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Kindergarten, Table & 4 chair
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I have heard some folks in the U.S. who have bought Mahogany at incredible high prices up to USD $9 / BF.
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The highest price I have found for mahogany here in Quintana Roo is USD $3 / BF for standard quality wood. However you can also find mahogany in lower quality for just USD $2 / BF, at this price you can also get the standard quality but in shorter lengths.
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I apologize for the poor quality of the images. My digital camera stayed home and had to take pictures with my cell phone camera.
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Nos vemos luego!!!
