Tropical wood · Africa
African Canarium wood
African Canarium (Canarium schweinfurthii, family Burseraceae) is a tropical timber from Africa. Dry, its Janka hardness is 670 lbf (2,980 N), and air-dry it weighs about 30 lb/ft³ (481 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 355–356.
Other names, by country: Abel (Cameroon), Aiélé (Ivory Coast), Elemi (Nigeria), Bediwunua, Eyere (Ghana), Mwafu (Uganda).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- 670 lbf (2,980 N)
- Green: 520 lbf (2,313 N)
- As printed: “Janka side hardness 520 lb for green material and 670 lb for dry.”
- Air-dry density
- 30 lb/ft³ (481 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.40 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) about 0.40; air-dry density 30 pcf.”
- Shrinkage, green to 12% moisture content
- 4.5% tangential
- Radial 2.5%
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 4 data sets, from different tests and sources, so they can differ widely; all are shown, in the sheet's order, each at the moisture content printed beside it, never restated as 12%.
| Moisture | Bending strength (MOR) | Stiffness (MOE) | Crushing strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| Green | 5,900 psi (41 MPa) | 0.9 million psi (6.2 GPa) | 3,130 psi (22 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 10,100 psi (70 MPa) | 1.18 million psi (8.1 GPa) | 6,160 psi (42 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 8,740 psi (60 MPa) | — | 4,830 psi (33 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 10,750 psi (74 MPa) | 1.31 million psi (9 GPa) | 6,240 psi (43 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood a light pinkish-brown or light pinkish-yellow; sapwood whitish or straw colored, wide, not clearly differentiated. Texture somewhat coarse; grain interlocked sometimes producing a very attractive roe figure; lustrous; pleasant characteristic scent, without taste.
- Working properties
- Timber works easily with machine and hand tools but has a severe blunting effect on cutters because of silica content, sharp knives are required to avoid a woolly finish in planing, glues and nails satisfactorily, peels and slices easily.
- Durability
- Heartwood not resistant to decay and is vulnerable to termite attack; sapwood liable to attack by powder-post beetles. Logs must be protected with insecticides and fungicides and converted as soon as possible.
- Uses
- Plywood, decorative veneers, parquetry, joinery, furniture components.
- Where it grows
- Widely distributed in East, Central, and West Africa.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 355–356, a USDA Forest Products Laboratory work in the public domain.
Work it out for your project
- Rank woods for furniture with the species picker
Weigh african Canarium against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.