Category :    Light Hardwoods

Species

General Characteristics

Sapwood lighter in colour and moderately distinct; heartwood is light yellow-brown, often with a greenish or olive tinge, weathering to a light-brown; planed surface without lustre; faint stripe figure on radial surface; texture moderately fine or moderately coarse but even; grain interlocked; moderately hard to cut across grain; air dry density on an average 656 kg/m³ (41 lb/ft³) with a possible range of 576 to 736 kg/m³ (36 to 46 lb/ft³); not durable in contact with the ground or exposed positions.

Structure

Growth rings absent.
Vessels with simple perforation; medium-sized; moderately few in number; mostly solitary, others in radial, tangential or oblique pairs and radial multiples of up to 4 in a series; fairly evenly distributed with a tendency (less pronounced than in light red meranti, dark red meranti, white meranti, etc.) to align in short oblique lines; tyloses occasionally present but sparse; deposits absent.
Wood parenchyma of both paratracheal and apotracheal types present; paratracheal type as incomplete vasicentric, narrow vasicentric or aliform, tending to locally confluent; the apotracheal as irregularly spaced bands containing resin canals and occasional short tangential layers.
Rays medium-sized, visible to the naked eye on cross-section; not prominent on a radial surface.
Ripple marks absent.

Other Features

Burning splinter test: Splinter burns to ash.
Froth test: Negative.

Uses