Tropical wood · Tropical America
Kaneelhart wood
Kaneelhart (Licaria spp., family Lauraceae) is a tropical timber from tropical America. Dry, its Janka hardness is 2,900 lbf (12,900 N), and air-dry it weighs about 52–72 lb/ft³ (833–1,153 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 185–186.
Other names, by country: Brown silverballi, Kharemero shiruaballi (Guyana), Kaneelhart, Raneel-pisie (Surinam), Bois canelle (French Guiana).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- 2,900 lbf (12,900 N)
- Green: 2,210 lbf (9,831 N)
- As printed: “Janka side hardness 2,210 lb for green material and 2,900 lb at 12% moisture content.”
- Air-dry density
- 52–72 lb/ft³ (833–1,153 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.68–0.96 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) varies with species from 0.68 to 0.96; air-dry density 52 to 72 pcf.”
- Shrinkage, green to oven-dry
- 7.9% tangential
- Radial 3.4%, volumetric 12.5%
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 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Green | 22,270 psi (154 MPa) | 3.82 million psi (26.3 GPa) | 13,390 psi (92 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 29,860 psi (206 MPa) | 4.06 million psi (28 GPa) | 17,400 psi (120 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood orange or brown-yellow when freshly cut; darkening to yellowish-brown or coffee-brown on exposure and sometimes with a tinge of red or violet. Sapwood is light yellowish-brown. The wood has a fragrant odor most of which is lost on drying. Texture is fine to medium; moderately lustrous; grain straight to slightly interlocked.
- Working properties
- High density material is difficult to work but cuts smoothly; tends to splinter in boring. Requires care in gluing; takes an excellent finish.
- Durability
- Excellent resistance to both brown-rot and white-rot fungi; also rated very high resistance to dry-wood termites. There is little resistance to attack by marine borers.
- Uses
- Furniture, turnery, boat building, heavy construction, and parquet flooring.
- Where it grows
- Centered mostly in the Guianas; found in association with Greenheart on hilly terrain, also in Wallaba forests on sandy soils. Occurrence is only occasional.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 185–186, 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 kaneelhart against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.