I just wanted some opinions on the wood Purpleheart (or Amaranth), particularly when used in flutes. I know that Sweetheart and Skip Healy both offer it as an option. I’ve looked up some of the wood properties and it appears that Purpleheart is both denser and harder than Blackwood. From the literature that I’ve seen; it may well be the hardest wood suitable for making flutes.
Jordan - using google I didn’t find a site with purpleheart being denser than blackwood (or cocobolo for that matter). The sites I saw had purpleheart well below 1.000 whereas blackwood was 1.2 and cocobolo 1.1).
It’s a pretty wood, but I always thought it was on par with Honduras rosewood regarding strength and density.
Purpleheart is one of the hardest woods I believe. Harder than blackwood or cocobolo. However, it’s only heavier than blackwood by a very small margin, and it’s not quite as heavy as cocobolo. I hate turning the stuff though because the grain tears easily. You can get a good finish on it though. I’d be concerned with how well it withstands moisture and I guess the jury’s still out on that as there aren’t many flutes made of this stuff floating around. Sometimes harder = more brittle from what I understand. Also there’s the fact that you’d have a flute that’s, like, purple. It becomes a deep dark purple after exposed to some sunlight; I guess it’d be kind of funky looking. I’m not sure how it would react to fuming.
I have a Sweetheart keyless in purpleheart. It plays well, and looks great. However, the inside of the “body” section is not particularly smooth. It looks/feels as though it has torn accross the grain. Suggests to me that it is not so easy to turn. The inside of the head section is how you expect it to be, so maybe it is the particular piece of timber that was used for the body? Anyway, I am not sure how much this affects the tone - I am a relative beginner, but experienced players have tried the flute and liked the sound and playability.
I have some purpleheart turned and aging. The stuff is funny to turn. The best finish seems to be running an insert very hot (nasty smoke). A sharp bit seems to tear the grain.
There was a Sweetheart C flute at Lark in Seattle that I tried. I don’t know if it was Amaranth but it looked purple. It was a rockin’ flute and was tempted to take it home with me.
Purplehart is beautiful when turned, but turns into an un interesting dark brown with time.
it also is not as heavy, oily or vibrant as Blackwood or the Rosewoods, and cracks easily.
i’ve used it over the years, mostly to highlight areas of the work.
it also has open grain, and tares easily when turned. it’s dry like Ebony. I would rather have an instrument out of Rosewood or Blackwood.
The key here I think is the property described as “cross-linked”.
The rosewoods (Dalbergia genus) have lateral connections between wood fibers. They are difficult to split with the grain. They don’t produce splinters to the extent that other woods do. When drilled or reamed they produce less “fuzz” (fine splinters) than other woods do. (There may be examples of other genuses that are crosslinked.)
I’ve used other woods for woodwinds, but I find I have to sand the bore with several increasingly-fine grits and then finish with tung or linseed oil. And even then it won’t be as smooth as rosewoods such as African blackwood or cocobolo. There’s probably a threshold below which it doesn’t matter. The flutes often sound fine.
I agree. The simple test for cross-linked grain would be trying to rive a piece of the wood. The same quality that makes wood easy to form into a NA flute (by traditional methods) makes for difficulty in the land of gun-drills and high-speed machining.
So where does Cherry fit in? Seems to have a split personality.
