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Any idea what this wood is?

Looks like Wenge to me -

M

Does kinda, don’t it...

All the Eko Rangers I've seen and worked on were Rosewood, but not really top quality.
Pic doesn't have the pores for Wenge, I was working with some yesterday.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Fingerboard is Brazilian, so I expect bridge also. (Definitely NOT wenge)

Interestingly, I have one arriving next week. First guitar I’ve bought in 30 years. A dead ringer for the one received from my parents as a gift when I was 13.


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Yup, shoulda looked up what an Eko guitar was before commenting.

M

Brazillian rosewood?

There's such a strange texture to this wood. It's almost like a rippled potato chip along the dark and light lines.

You are half-right. It does look like wenge, except for the lack of pores. That's some very stripey rosewood, for sure. From the days when exotic meant dramatic grain patterns.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

If it washed up on shore maybe it's Natalie Wood?

That's probably a weird cut of Indian rosewood that's been bleached by UV a bit which is why it's brown. If you sand it down a bit it'll turn purple probably.

Lots of Eko guitars around in the 60's and early 70's, especially 12 strings. Like most guitars over fifty bucks, Brazilian rosewood. It was cheap back then. My first luthier catalog was Lewis Luthier Supply, and it was eight bucks for IRW and ten for BRW. Wish I would have bought a ton.

Brent

It's defa brownish wood.

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Hutch

Get the heck off the couch and go build a guitar!!!!

Had to refit a warped lifting bridge to an Eko, looked almost exactly like that, wavy grin as well.
Lotsa sanding involved to get the soundboard radius 'bout right underneath the bridge, but the smell, def IRW, not BRW - (I collect BRW bridge blanks and have used quite a few).
It was a similar story on a FB extention, sanding level and refreting (my own)
Two bucks is a lot of green when you'r producing the kind of volumes Eko was putting out, minimum estimate of 100,000 up to 200,000 at 2 bucks is 200,000 - 400,000 US dollars, equivalent to 2 - 4 million in today's money.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

The bridge is probably wenge. The fingerboard is wenge.

Smell test should settle it. Looks like Wenge to me.

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John

Having worked with both, Wenge and BRW, I am tendinbg to see here Wenge.
I do not know so much about EKO guitars and which woods they were using back in these days.

But these pics being BRW? I dont know.....

My sister bought a 12 string Eko back in 1979 or 80 . The bridge looks instantly familiar. I learned my first chords on that guitar. To my ears that guitar sounded great back then. I always wondered what they used for finish - it looked like it was 1/8” thick. My guess is the bridge is wenge.