Tropical wood · Africa
African Blackwood wood
African Blackwood (Dalbergia melanoxylon, family Leguminosae) is a tropical timber from Africa. Air-dry, it weighs about 83 lb/ft³ (1,330 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 385–386.
Other names, by country: Mufunjo (Uganda), Mpingo, Mugembe (Tanzania), Babanus (Sudan), Mukelete (Rhodesia), Grenadilla (Mozambique).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- Not printed
- Air-dry density
- 83 lb/ft³ (1,330 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 1.08 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) about 1.08; air-dry density 83 pcf.”
- Shrinkage
- Not as one figure
- As printed: “Shrinkage green to ovendry: volumetric 7.6%.”
One source: USDA Forest Products Laboratory, Tropical Timbers of the World (Chudnoff, 1979 edition), the only published source read for this wood
Strength
Bending strength is the modulus of rupture (MOR); stiffness is the modulus of elasticity (MOE); crushing strength is compression parallel to the grain. The sheet collects these from published tests: it prints one data set, each at the moisture content printed beside it, never restated as 12%.
| Moisture | Bending strength (MOR) | Stiffness (MOE) | Crushing strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12% MC | 31,000 psi (214 MPa) | 2.98 million psi (20.5 GPa) | 10,800 psi (74 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood dark purplish-brown with black streaking; sharply demarcated from the narrow yellowish sapwood. Texture fine and even; grain straight; luster low; slightly oily.
- Working properties
- Sawteeth blunt rapidly, difficult to plane with hand or machine tools. Excellent for turnery and can be worked to a smooth, lustrous finish. Woodwind instruments are machined with metal-working equipment.
- Durability
- Heartwood is rated as highly durable, moderately resistant to termites, sometimes attacked by borers in the standing trees; sapwood liable to attack by powderpost beetle.
- Uses
- Used primarily for the manufacture of woodwind instruments, but also used for other turnery work, brush backs, knife handles, walking sticks, inlay work, carvings, etc.
- Where it grows
- A rather extensive range in savanna regions from Sudan southward to Mozambique, westward to Angola, and then northward to Nigeria and Senegal.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 385–386, a USDA Forest Products Laboratory work in the public domain.
Work it out for your project
- Rank woods for carving with the species picker
Weigh african Blackwood against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.