# Bubinga Slab



## therookie (Aug 29, 2010)

I am 15 years old and found a truley amazing looking piece of bubinga. there are a couple of questions that i have.

1. Is $6000 a good price for 12/4 by 51 inches wide by 16 feet long a good price
2. Is high figure a good thing
3. How much can i expect this to weigh
4. What would fellow LJ's make out of this

Also here is a pic (All the way at the bootom of the link)

http://www.goodhopehardwoods.com/bubinga-slabs.html


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## richgreer (Dec 25, 2009)

At $6000 this works out to just under $30/bf. That seems a little high but not terribly unreasonable if it has great figure.

Yes, high figure is what you want. With Bubinga, people talk of a "waterfall figure" which is a very high figure and very nice.

How much is it going to weight? A lot. At least a ton.

This sounds like an incredible conference room table.


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## rance (Sep 30, 2009)

Two ways to make a profit with that board. 1) like Rich says, make a conf. table and sell it for $15,000 or 2) Turn 5875 pens on your lathe and sell them. At a discounted $60 ea. you'd net $352,500. Now you understand why I turn pens, seriously.


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## dbray45 (Oct 19, 2010)

Before buying it, I would have a way to move it, a way to mill it or process it, a customer with cash before making an offer to buy. This board will take some serious equipment and time to make it profitable. That's a good sized forklift behind it, holding it up, not what I would put in a pickup truck and drive away.


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## therookie (Aug 29, 2010)

Ok well thanks for the feed back, turning pens sounds like fun how would i go about doing that. and a conference table would look nice, but where would i sell it? my school or a huge coorperation?


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## PurpLev (May 30, 2008)

buying that size of a Bubinga slab and making pens out of it is sacrilege - and I am not being sarcastic if you do some research on the source of Bubinga and the implications that arise from that.

as mentioned, putting money aside which obviously is not an issue, you should have the means to mill and work that large slab before anything else comes to play.


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## therookie (Aug 29, 2010)

ok that makes sense and turning that all into pen blanks would be a wast of a good piece of wood. Would any one have any suggestions on where to sell such a large conference table.


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## teenagewoodworker (Jan 31, 2008)

Ahh Good Hope hardwoods that where I got my slab from they are great people you can really trust them to hook you up with some great stuff! That's about the rate I paid for my slab the thing I would recommend is don't get the 12/4 unless you need pieces that are 3 inches thick. it is a bear to machine. To resaw somthing like this you would need a really good industrial bandsaw. I got it done with a 14" bandsaw but i only resawed 6" pieces with a carbide blade and i broke that. It's really tough stuff. machining the top of my table went through 2 straight bits and my routers not looking so good. I'm not trying to discourage you from buying it just remember it is really really really tough stuff. and really hard to work with. also I would expect a slab like that to weight close to 500 pounds… actually on second thought more than that I think mine weighed about 200 or 250 (probably more though) and it was half as thick and 10 inches less in width. ask Skip from Good hope he should have a good idea of how much it weighs hes a great guy too he'll be able to tell you everything about it.

If you're going to make it into a conference table again I would go with something closer to 8/4 or 6/4. surfacing it will be tough too it needs to be flat so make sure you have a way to do that. It would probably be some type of organization (for profit organization) who would buy a table like this for corporate meetings. I wouldn't expect a school to buy something like this. and once you see how much work goes into workign with this you might be more inclined to sell it for closer to 20,000… without a giant widebelt sander it will take a long time to surface.


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## therookie (Aug 29, 2010)

ok that helps out a little bit more and come to think of it 12/4 is a little big so 8/4 probably will be better. I am thinking that to find a buyer i need to go around and ask coorperations if they would like to buy somthing like that. or what is the best way to go about doing that. Meaning how do you get a coorperation to buy somthing like that


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## Dusty56 (Apr 20, 2008)

"how do you get a coorperation to buy somthing like that" 
To start with , Show them all of the pictures of your previous projects and get excellent referrals from all of your customers . Invite them to see your projects at your other customers' conference rooms , if possible.

Have you attended any woodworking schools ? There are quite a few out there to learn the basics from and then go on to be a true Craftsman after graduation. : ) 
Best wishes !


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## therookie (Aug 29, 2010)

ok i see where you are going with that and that all makes sense. i appreciate the good feed back


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## CharlesNeil (Oct 21, 2007)

I personally buy from Good Hope all the time, Skip and Norman are the best… not cheap, but you certainly get what you pay for.. I have never been dissapointed,, never.,been dealing with them for about 18 or 20 years..

if you would like to see their operation and meet them, here ya go, 




just for fun there are about 6 or 7 videos on you tube I did ,


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## Dusty56 (Apr 20, 2008)

Start out with some Pine or what ever is cheapest in your location and make a few Shaker style end tables , one at a time …..see how much you've learned by the time you get to the last one : ) Then proceed to more difficult styles of furniture . Never give up !!
Have a great time while learning this wonderful hobby / trade : )


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