What wood is this?
 

A friend recently acquired a 1"x18""x60" piece of wood from his father, who says it is rosewood. It is at least 40 years old. Can anyone tell what flavor of rosewood it might be?

It could be some type of rosewood but it's not possible to tell with just that photo.

Hard to say based on the photo. I use smell and density to help identify rosewoods. I am not ruling out Brazilian, but that is a rather wide board. The smell of Brazilian rosewood is pretty distinctive, and the old growth wood tends to be in the 54-59 pounds per cubic foot range. Guatemalan Rosewood is less dense, and Honduran and cocobolo are denser. It doesn't really look like Indian to me.

It definitely has that rosewood look to it. Try the scratch and sniff test. If it smells like that bubble gum that you used to get in a pack of baseball cards then it could be BRW.

Is rosewood open grained like that (I honestly don't know)? I think I can see the pores following the grain lines

Yes it is. This is a BRW head plate and you can see how open the pores are. It needs to be filled to get a glass smooth finish.

https://i.imgur.com/KvfGfPOh.jpg

It's hard to tell from the photo. I doubt it is Brazilian given the age but I agree with John that it doesn't quite look like Indian either. It does look like some type of rosewood tho.

Every rosewood I've ever seen has an open grain.

Looks like cocobolo after is oxidizes a long time. Sand it some and get a smell, that's the best way to tell. I bet if you sand it some it will really red and orange up that color.

Would be great if you could post an after picture too (after you fill it).

Sure thing.

https://i.imgur.com/NCS2rNth.jpg

Very nice.

Done without cnc, that looks really good

Steve

Thanks! Dark wood and black CA are very forgiving.