Tropical wood · Tropical America
White Peroba wood
White Peroba (Paratecoma peroba, family Bignoniaceae) is a tropical timber from tropical America. Dry, its Janka hardness is 1,600 lbf (7,117 N), and air-dry it weighs about 46 lb/ft³ (737 kg/m³). The figures are from the USDA Forest Products Laboratory's Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 221–222.
Other names, by country: Ipe peroba, Peroba, Peroba branca, Peroba manchada (Brazil).
Key numbers
- Janka hardness, dry
- 1,600 lbf (7,117 N)
- As printed: “Janka side hardness 1,600 lb at 12% moisture content.”
- Air-dry density
- 46 lb/ft³ (737 kg/m³)
- Basic specific gravity
- 0.60 oven-dry weight, green volume
- As printed: “Basic specific gravity (ovendry weight/green volume) 0.60; air-dry density 46 pcf.”
- Shrinkage, green to oven-dry
- 6.6% tangential
- Radial 3.8%, volumetric 10.5%
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 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Green | 14,100 psi (97 MPa) | 1.49 million psi (10.3 GPa) | 6,500 psi (45 MPa) |
| 15% MC | 16,900 psi (117 MPa) | — | 7,800 psi (54 MPa) |
| 12% MC | 16,200 psi (112 MPa) | 1.65 million psi (11.4 GPa) | 9,260 psi (64 MPa) |
A dash means the sheet prints no value; none is filled in.
What the data sheet says
- Color, grain and texture
- Heartwood light olive, with a yellowish, greenish, or reddish hue, sometimes indistinctly striped; sharply demarcated from the white or yellowish sapwood. Texture is fine; fairly lustrous; grain commonly interlocked with a narrow stripe or roey figure; without distinctive odor or taste. Fine dust produced in machining causes skin irritations in some workers.
- Working properties
- The wood is reported to machine easily but care is needed in planing quartered surfaces. Easy to glue and finish. As noted, may cause dermatitis in some workers.
- Durability
- The heartwood is rated very durable in resistance to attack by decay fungi.
- Uses
- Fine furniture, interior joinery, decking and flooring, vats and tanks for foodstuffs, decorative veneers.
- Where it grows
- Coastal forests of eastern Brazil ranging from Bahia to Rio de Janeiro.
Quoted from Tropical Timbers of the World, pp. 221–222, 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 white Peroba against other woods on hardness, weight, movement and color, every figure from the Wood Handbook.