Fellow GO fans,

I am looking for a high quality, solid kaya board, with engraved or milled grid lines.
I am a beginner but value craftsmanship.
The grid size would be 9x9 or 13x13.

Do you know of any makers in the USA which make quality boards?

Thank you…Jerry
August 8th, 2014
Mesa Arizona

It does seem unlikely anyone would take a nice solid kaya board and engrave or mill it. Good luck finding one, but I think you'll have to get a custom job.

Good luck finding a custom maker who has a stock of properly dried Japanese kaya in the USA.
You might consider Torreya californica (California nutmeg) instead of Torreya nucifera (Japanese kaya) as the former is a native wood in America. It's probably the closest thing you'll get to Japanese kaya in the USA. Note that California nutmeg is described as rare but locally abundant so it's not so easily available.
However, I found a link to a lumber company which seems to have some slabs of California nutmeg available. http://www.almquistlumber.com/specials.html
You might want to negotiate with them for a piece big enough for your board, and then find a custom wood workshop to make a custom board to your specs.

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
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Go is such a beautiful game.

Hi Jerry, and welcome to L19. The short answer to your questions is, there are none.

As oren and tchan mentioned, it's very unlikely you would even find a source for unfinished Kaya in North America, let alone the Western Hemisphere. As far as I know, the only sources for genuine Kaya are in Japan. You might have some luck finding a vintage board on ebay, and then have it resurfaced. But the thought of resurfacing a genuine Kaya goban and engraving a 9x9 or 13x13 grid on it is horrifying.

Your best bet is to use another wood species like white spruce. Go boards made out of this type of spruce are called Shin Kaya - Japanese for "new kaya." Depending on the desired thickness of your solid board, proper drying time in a controlled environment can be substantial. While Kaya is somewhat unique in this respect, properly stabilizing (air dried, not kiln dried) any rough-cut lumber over 2 inches thick takes several years at minimum, and then further drying is needed after it's been dimensioned. Thicker pieces need more drying time.

The above are just prerequisites. You would still need to find someone with that type of stock on hand. The lumber company tchan referenced would be a good place to start. The easy part is finding a woodworker to engrave the lines for you, which could be done in an afternoon.

_________________
"This is a game that rewards patience and balance. You must think like a man of action and act like a man of thought."
-Jonas Skarssen

However there are two unknowns.

1) I believe that long experience has determined the best woods for go boards from among those species native to eastern Asia. But that is not the same things as saying best among all the species of trees on the planet. I suspect that those species of trees from elsewhere that are common commercial species for lumber have also been investigated by the Japanese. But again, many that might be locally available aren't available in the international lumber trade.

2) Especially with species not normally used for lumber there exists the possibility of large "standing dead" trees. It takes a long time to properly air dry and stabilize woods cut from live trees, about a year per inch of thickness. But some trees dry stable if standing dead a number of years.

Why bother making a really nice 9x9 or 13x13 board? Unless you plan on not improving and moving onto the full-size board, you'd end up with a board you want to keep for years that's only really useful in your first few months of playing.

Why should a 9x9/13x13 board become obsolete if one begins playing on 19x19?

I definitely prefer 19x19, too, but I also play 9x9 and 13x13 all the time, either with beginners for whom 19x19 is too large, or if time’s too short for a 19x19 game.

Greetings, Tom

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“The only difference between me and a madman is that I’m not mad.” — Salvador Dali ★ Play a slooooow correspondence game with me on OGS?

Maybe they'll be like me and have no interest in playing on 13x13 or 9x9 again.

Yeah, well, I know there are lots of bigheads out there, but we wouldn’t be like that, or … would we?

_________________
“The only difference between me and a madman is that I’m not mad.” — Salvador Dali ★ Play a slooooow correspondence game with me on OGS?

Fellow Go fans,

Many thanks for the time you spent in answering my initial message. I learned from your responses, due to my beginning status, that engraving or milling the grid lines is not a good thing.
Also, thank you for the tip on where to find nice wood in California.
I like the idea of locating an older used board in Kaya. I will keep my eyes open for an opportunity....many thanks again for your kind responses, Jerry