It came from the black lagoon...

[Hellzero]

There is a bias in your system, it comes from the USA, where, for example, maple and walnut are local, but China has to import almost every wood they are using for manufacturing instruments, so the prices will be quite the same for maple or wenge, furthermore if they used wenge, it's because it was cheaper than the usual walnut for that skunk stripe as the politics of the Chinese factories is to always use what is the cheapest option.

 

Check this supplier prices for a more accurate representation of the value of current woods used in luthiery and you'll see that wenge is a non expensive wood, in the lower range: https://luthierssupplies.co.uk/product-category/electric/electric-neck-blanks/through-neck-splices/bass-through-neck-splices/?orderby=price

 

Edited yesterday at 10:24 by Hellzero
Link added

[neepheid]

1 hour ago, Hellzero said:

There is a bias in your system, it comes from the USA, where, for example, maple and walnut are local, but China has to import almost every wood they are using for manufacturing instruments, so the prices will be quite the same for maple or wenge, furthermore if they used wenge, it's because it was cheaper than the usual walnut for that skunk stripe as the politics of the Chinese factories is to always use what is the cheapest option.

 

Check this supplier prices for a more accurate representation of the value of current woods used in luthiery and you'll see that wenge is a non expensive wood, in the lower range: https://luthierssupplies.co.uk/product-category/electric/electric-neck-blanks/through-neck-splices/bass-through-neck-splices/?orderby=price

 

 

Thanks for the followup - every day's a school day.  I guess my perception is that I've only seen wenge widely used in expensive instruments where it is used as a marketing tool/flex.