Tropical wood · Africa
Essia wood
Essia (Combretodendron macrocarpum, family Lecythidaceae) is a tropical timber from Africa. Dry, its Janka hardness is 2,180 lbf (9,697 N), and air-dry it weighs about 53 lb/ft³ (849 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 371–372.
Other names, by country: Abalé (Ivory Coast), Owewe (Nigeria), Abing (Cameroon), Abin (Gabon), Minzu (Zaire).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- 2,180 lbf (9,697 N)
- As printed: “Janka side hardness 2,180 lb for dry material.”
- Air-dry density
- 53 lb/ft³ (849 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.70 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) about 0.70; air-dry density 53 pcf.”
- Shrinkage, green to oven-dry
- 10.4% tangential
- Radial 5.4%, volumetric 14.2%
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 3 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 | 20,300 psi (140 MPa) | 2.1 million psi (14.5 GPa) | 10,850 psi (75 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 16,600 psi (114 MPa) | 1.52 million psi (10.5 GPa) | 8,100 psi (56 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 15,400 psi (106 MPa) | 1.83 million psi (12.6 GPa) | 7,400 psi (51 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood reddish to dark red-brown, sometimes with darker streaks; sapwood yellowish-white, clearly demarcated. Texture fine to moderately coarse; grain varying from straight to interlocked; when freshly-cut wood has a rotten cabbage odor which disappears on drying.
- Working properties
- Rather difficult to work, saws moderately well, dresses to good finish but there is tearing of interlocked grain, may char in boring, has poor steambending qualities, glues satisfactorily.
- Durability
- Heartwood is resistant to moderately resistant to attack by decay fungi and termites, sometimes damaged by pinhole borers.
- Uses
- Sliced to produce decorative veneers, heavy construction work where end splitting and checking are not objectionable.
- Where it grows
- Throughout tropical West Africa, fairly common in wet forest areas, infrequent in the dry high forests.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 371–372, a USDA Forest Products Laboratory work in the public domain.
Work it out for your project
- Rank woods for your project with the species picker
Weigh essia against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.