what wood is this?

[crazylegs]

Got this unnamed blank any one tell me what wood it is?  Cherry?

[seventhdevil]

i'll need some real close ups to give you a definitive answer on this one.

yes it is the colour of cherry but lacks the grain you usually see in the wood and there are other species that can have that colour on occasion.

is it hard?
is it heavy?
does it smell?
was it difficult to turn?
is this the colour of the wood or the finish?

[crazylegs]

light, easy to turn, no real smell and just finished with walnut oil.

[seventhdevil]

that narrows it down but i still need a good closeup of the side, face and endgrain to tell you what it is.

so far it could be any of the following genuses, aesculus, salix, populus, acer and alnus.

[crazylegs]

Here are some closer shots. No real end grain to show. Excuse the photography.

[The Bowler Hatted Turner]

One wonders if it is Brazilian Mahogany (Swietenia Macrophylla) (?)

[seventhdevil]

still not close enough.

i should have said that i need a crystal clear image of a 1-2" square of the wood.

it sort of looks like horse chestnut.

[crazylegs]

this is about as close as I can get.

[seventhdevil]

not 100% sure to be honest but i think it would be either alder or lime neither of which are timbers i use frequently and so i'm somewhat unfamiliar with them (now there's something i don't often say) but perhaps someone who is more familiar with one of the species could point you in a particular direction.

[Les Symonds]

Even after all these photos, there's too much room for doubt to nail this one, which is why I didn't join this thread from the outset. However, my first thoughts were of alder, which I've turned loads of and still have plenty in stock. It certainly fits the general description of, "...light, easy to turn, no real smell".
If you know this to be a home-grown timber, then I think that alder is as good a guess as you're going to get, but if this was an imported timber, then the world is your oyster. A recent study at Bournemouth University placed 1575 different species on the list of commercially produced timbers and not even the wood database can describe that many.
Les

[crazylegs]

looking at both of these I am leaning towards alder as well. I thought alder would be lighter so I discounted this. I is likely to be native as I got it from an elderly gentleman. I could not see him spending money on imported stuff. Many thanks for all your help. I am sticking with Alder.

[Les Symonds]

...I thought alder would be lighter so I discounted this....

Fair point, especially if you look at the images on sites such as "The Wood Database", which show European Alder and which is generally lighter than our common field alder, which isn't grown commercially and which tends to be a little more orange-coloured than the commercial stock.
Les