Tropical wood · Africa
Erythroxylum manii wood
Erythroxylum manii (Erythroxylum manii, family Erythroxylaceae) is a tropical timber from Africa. Air-dry, it weighs about 40 lb/ft³ (641 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 409–410.
Other names, by country: Bmini (Sierra Leone), Dabé, Ndabé (Ivory Coast), Ditsumi (Gabon), Lukiènzo (Zaire).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- Not printed
- Air-dry density
- 40 lb/ft³ (641 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.50 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) about 0.50; air-dry density 40 pcf.”
- Shrinkage
- Not as one figure
- As printed: “Volumetric shrinkage green to ovendry: 11.6%.”
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 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 | 13,000 psi (90 MPa) | — | 7,450 psi (51 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 15,200 psi (105 MPa) | — | 8,200 psi (57 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood pink or red-brown; sapwood gray with a copper sheen. Texture fine, generally even; grain interlocked to irregular; numerous pith flecks forming dark lines 1-2 in. long. LANDA
- Working properties
- Saws well and works easily with hand and machine tools, dresses well, good gluing and finishing properties, good veneer slicing and peeling properties.
- Durability
- Heartwood moderately durable but liable to some termite attack. Good weathering properties.
- Uses
- General construction, furniture, joinery, veneer and plywood.
- Where it grows
- Somewhat sporadically from Sierra Leone to the Cameroons and inland to the Congo; found in both deciduous and rain forests, mainly in small groups.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 409–410, 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 erythroxylum manii against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.