Identifying white-faced ply

[JohnD]

A local timber merchant who specialises is selling end-of-line and overstock items he has bought cheap, and usually has some good bargains, has some 18mm marine ply at £22+ per sheet.

However the face is not red tropical hardwood as usual, but a white timber with no perceptible grain. It does not look like birch ply, it looks more like maple. But I understand Maple is not a durable timber, so I wonder what it might be. The yard hand doesn't know.

I want to use it for flooring

Any ideas?

 

[ladylola]

Without seeing it's not really possible to say, but if it's maple then I wouldn't think there would be a problem using it for flooring. When a timber is said not to be durable it generally means not durable to the weather and such like i.e. no good for outside use, but unless you are planning to use it in areas that will get wet a lot I wouldn't worry.

 

[JohnD]

Thanks!

seems odd that the yard hand says the stamps identify it as Marine ply. I did not take a note of the marks unfortunately.

 

[Jasonb]

Gaboon marine ply can be quite light in colour

Jason

 

[JohnD]

the surface didn't seem to have any visible grain or figuring - not even as much as birch-ply. That was why I was thinking of maple. Does gaboon look like that when unvarnished? Is it a common face for marine ply? (I have only ever seen it with reddish hardwood so-called "mahogany" face.

Do you know what I should be looking for in a stamp or edge-marking?

 

[Patochik]

As your man above has said 'Gaboon' used to be used widely as a face veneer for Marine plywood - nowadays it is much less common but still available from time to time. The veneer is very bland and straw coloured, so could be what you are looking for.

With regards to the marking of the board you should be looking for 'BS1088' (the relevent standard for marine plywood) and all marine boards should be stamped somewhere on either the face or the edge of the board.

If you can get the mark I can probably confirm what sort of rep the mill has.