Tropical wood · Africa
Dina wood
Dina (Swartzia fistuloides, family Leguminosae) is a tropical timber from Africa. Air-dry, it weighs about 64 lb/ft³ (1,025 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 515–516.
Other names, by country: Oken, Ndina, Awong (Gabon), Kiela Kusu (Congo-Brazzaville).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- Not printed
- Air-dry density
- 64 lb/ft³ (1,025 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.82 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) 0.82; air-dry density 64 pcf.”
- Shrinkage, green to oven-dry
- 5.8% tangential
- Radial 4.2%, volumetric 10.7%
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 2 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12% MC | 25,800 psi (178 MPa) | 2.58 million psi (17.8 GPa) | 13,100 psi (90 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 22,400 psi (154 MPa) | 2.38 million psi (16.4 GPa) | 13,800 psi (95 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood pink, yellow, or dark brown, striped with red-brown bands on quartered surfaces; sapwood whitish or pale brown, distinct. Texture rather coarse; grain wavy or interlocked.
- Working properties
- Works well with machine tools, planes satisfactorily with little grain tearing, often chars in boring, glues well, can be cut into veneers if steamed or heated.
- Durability
- Heartwood is very durable and is immune to termites and other insects.
- Uses
- Tool handles, veneer, turnery, carvings.
- Where it grows
- From Ivory Coast to Gabon and the Congo region; found in the dense rain forests, in small groups.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 515–516, 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 dina against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.