Thread: What is the hardest wood you have turned

Below are 2 pot pourii bowls around 180mm dia made from the same very old 200x75 recycled hardwood plank around 2m long I bought for $20 a while ago. It was like rock and very heavy, I struggled to carry it on my own to the car from the secondhand yeard. It has very similar end grain to your first photo and my guess was Ironbark.

An old bit of redgum off the woodpile.

Brushbox tho not very hard is highly abrasive so you're constantly giving the tools a 'lick'.

So far, the hardest wood was a dry chunk of Persimmon [no pic].

For me , it is a tie between extremely curly grained heart rimu and the Appalachian oak heart that my cobber imports for making tables .
Both are as dry as a bone , and when turning platters , are rather noisy as well.

A peice of 20 year ol cocobolo given to me by my late brother, turned a coffe tamp handle from it it was so hard I considered taking it over to the metal lathe

Crapiarta pine!

WA Karri and some super dry mulga... hard stuff

Acacia Puce from Central Australia.
You can actually see sparks fly off it when turned and had to use glove to stop burns on hand.
It is now a protected species.

Would almost agree with WoodBTurner on the Waddi (acacia peuce) but of the 206 timbers I've tried, Quinine (petalostigma pubescens) has got to take the cake. Every bit of HSS I poked at it was trashed in just a few rotations - the only thing that ended up cutting it was one of those carbide bits and even that was a struggle. Damned hard stuff!

Mine was a nice piece of well seasoned brushbox which i made into a hefty mallet but I still had the little 1/2 hp clone when i did it. I was waiting to see the lathe head and shaft go motoring out through the workshop door (or roof) No blood spilt.

Hi everyone,

In more recent times (last 3 years), I had one particular piece of wood that I picked-up somewhere, originally though that was Black Wattle rut, or some sort of fruit tree but I got the "works" when I turned it into a bowel. Was tough going from the very beginning but about 2" in into the inside (hollowing), I hit "solid rock". I have tried every tool I had, and in no time they were unable to cut "butter in summer time!". With another inch or so to go, I gave up, finishing the inside surface with the power drill and sanding pads. Finished with 2 coats of Organoil, the surface and colours did come up beautifully. Always "heavy bottomed" giving the feeling of unbalanced some how, I decided to get it back to the lathe, a year latter, and try this new quality steel tool I had acquired for these situations. Manage to get the outside done a bit thinner and the inside walls just cleaned up when I decided to get that thick bottom removed once and for all. Better said than done, as I got a good grip on the tool expecting some degree of difficulty, within a couple of millimetres in, the hell broke loose and an "almighty" big bang went off, with timber projectiles flying in every direction. After turning the lathe off, and give a quick check-up on what I could see of myself, I did realise the extent of the damage, not on me no...! I was very lucky, the roof and some walls did show some "projectile impact". Was nothing left in the chuck and after some digging among wood shavings and searching on every cavity and surface I could see, I manage to find 9 pieces, many more never found. This thing just exploded...!, I still got the pieces, but identification of the timber species!

Cheers
RBTCO

Black Gidgee for a pen!

Dalbergia melanoxylon that we get out here - tried a lump a while back and didn't get much turning done- it still sits, in lump form waiting for me to get back to it.

http://www.exotichardwoods-africa.co...oodafrican.htm

Like a lot of things out here it has been severly over exploited and becoming increasingly rare. I have propagated and planted out hundreds of these, but it probably only takes a couple hundred years to mature!

New Guinea Rose wood this weekend at SWWS full of silica 3 no 4 finger gouges finally got it done all I was doing was making a hole for a candle stick holder

Or the first large piece I turned on the Jet a piece of Bottle Brush still unfinished sitting on my bench almost like concrete

I have propagated and planted out hundreds of these, but it probably only takes a couple hundred years to mature!

Well done for going to the trouble Andy.

Good model for the timeframe we should have in mind for our children, and theirs.