What timber is this

[tomartomau]

I have posted pictures of this box in the box making thread, the wood came out of house built c1910 and the decking was 25mm thick, does anyone know what timber it is?
My wife would like to tell her mother.

[Luke Maddux]

Could we get some closer photos of the grain? Do you have any pieces of it which haven't been finished?

How was it to work? Is it exceptionally hard or heavy?

[Luke Maddux]

It could potentially be Queensland Maple.

[tomartomau]

Hi Luke, it is both hard and heavy. I will get some pictures of the wood prior to finishing tomorrow.
Cheers Tony

[Kuffy]

My first thoughts would be spotted gum or turpentine. Probably spotted gum

[John.G]

I'll toss White Mahogany ( commonly called yellow stringy in Qld) into the pot.

[Mobyturns]

I'll toss White Mahogany ( commonly called yellow stringy in Qld) into the pot.


White Mahogany also produces a nice burl.

I presume the house was in Brisbane? Lots of timbers have been used for flooring, including hoop pine - which this is not btw. Can you give us a few more clues, curly, wavy. interlocked grain? density? hardness? workability? perhaps even smell?

[NathanaelBC]

Hope you can find those "before" photos or we're going to make you strip the finish off so we can see the natural colour!

[FenceFurniture]

I'm thinking possibly Tallow Wood (again!).

[tomartomau]

387981

[tomartomau]

387982

[FenceFurniture]

Well what you've shown there is definitely not Tallow wood, but equally it looks nothing like the box. Are you sure they're the same timber - could easily have been mixed species used in the flooring.

[tomartomau]

387986387985

[NathanaelBC]

That wavy pattern looks more like an acacia ... Australian Blackwood?

[Kidbee]

My guess is Spotted Gum.

[Gaza58]

I am going with spotted gum.... The red piece shown earlier looks like Red gum Both commonly used in Queensland houses. I love Red Gum for making chisel handles.

[Fuzzie]

I think the pic in #10 looks like Red Ironbark. The pic in #13 Spotted gum or Grey Ironbark.

[tomartomau]

Thanks everyone for your help, I'll call it spotted gum.
Cheers Tony

[elanjacobs]

Either Spotted or Blue Gum I think. Blue gum has a bit more pink in it than spotted

[John.G]

So heres the million dollar question guys: Given the information at hand what makes you think its Spotty?

I got a list of 6 (and a qualified 7 if its come out of a house in Bulimba or any of the adjoining suburbs) species it's more likely to be then spotty, and one reason why I think its unlikely to be spotty - so I'm really curious as to why so many of you lean towards Spotty.

[elanjacobs]

So heres the million dollar question guys: Given the information at hand what makes you think its Spotty?
The colour combined with wavy grain is the main indicator for me; both Spotted and Blue gum often have a gentle 20-30mm diagonal wave through them.

[Kuffy]

I just take a wild stab in the dark based on colour, grain structure, and the description of "hard and heavy". The top insert panel of the box looks exactly like a spotted gum coffee table I have sitting 13' away from me gathering dust. I don't put a lot of stock in an exact name or species. If someone wants to sell me pinus radiata which looks like spotted gum, weighs like spotted gum, is as hard as spotted gum, is greasy like spotted gum, then I am more than happy to pay the spotted gum price for what is actually pinus radiata.

[Mobyturns]

I think it is pretty unlikely that a positive ID will be achieved as the original floor was most likely a "mixed species" floor unless it came from a house of some notoriety. The other thing to keep in mind this has been in a dry environment for a long time so the grain features will be exagerated to what we expect to see. I tend to go with Turpentine or perhaps Brush Box.

[John.G]

Timber came out of a house in Brisbane circa 1910. Wood was described as deck timber : ie exposed to weather and probably a Class 1 hardwood. Of course it could be a replacement but we're going with what we know here okay...

In 1910 the timber had to get to Brisbane. So it would either be (a) locally sourced or arrive by (b) train or (c) ship. If arriving by train its from Queensland - the change of rail gauge to the south makes it unlikely to have arrived from NSW because the trains had to be crossloaded by hand and it was just cheaper and easier to bring timber in from elsewhere in Qld. We had a thriving rail network back then. By ship could mean from anywhere in the world because Brisbane was a bustling port city with shipping arriving from all over the world every day to discharge and load export cargo. Hence my Bulimba query because that was the traditional heart of Brisbanes boat building trade, and there was a steady trade in remounts ex Brisbane to India. But lets ignore exotics a bit.

I'm liking Turpentine / Brush Box / possibly Satinay as all being "local" species in that colour range.
White Mahogany is a definate possibility - I cut some last year and they looked just like that under a finish, and its another "local" species though would have been mostly used for sleepers and girders back then.
Crows Ash and Hickory Ash would be contenders. Both were readily available.
We better toss Johnstone River Hardwood into the ring as well, the unfinished dressed boards look very much like it. Every sawmill down the east coast of Queensland was near a railway siding, that was the backloading south for open goods wagons.
And I wouldnt rule out Tallow either because timber weathers funny sometimes.

Every timber on that list would have been readily available in Brisbane in 1910, is hard, heavy, Class 1, and has the right colour and grain range.



The reason I dont think its spotty is simple... the reason spotty is Qld's most readily available "hard and heavy" hardwood building timber today is because it was never really used for much until the 1980's so it didnt get cut much (hence the ready availability now) Spotty is basicly the $h!t that's left after 150 years of cutting down the best logs in the state, and I doubt it would have seen much utilisation as decking/flooring in federation buildings.

But I could be wrong... it could be any of the above including spotty, or something else entirely. Burning splinter test might help, as might smell and taste of wood but we cant just do those things over the internet huh? Thats half the fun of this, and part of the eason I asked "why spotty?" in case there was something you guys were seeing that I didnt know to look for

[Gaza58]

Thanks John... sounds like you have a hell of a lot more experience than me... Just went with Spotted Gum from my experience, which is limited. Most of the species that you mention I have never seen and from the history you refer to I would go against Spotted now as well. The red piece shown earlier looks very much like some second hand timber I have been calling Red gum here in Rockhampton but I may have been miss naming it all along. You are right we will really never know unless someone does a DNA test on it :D.. Interesting you say Brush box..... when I first saw it I was thinking Box but didn't know they used it for construction. It looked very much like some box that I used for fire wood out in Roma years ago. I turned a few pieces and it looked a lot like that grain. I guess many of the Eucalypt species are similar in appearance hence many of the guesses above being various Eucalypts and the odd Acacia which I doubt very much from my experience with that species.

[Mobyturns]

The second photo in post #13 was perhaps the most valuable photo for ID however the colour changes between all of the photos made it even more tricky. A shot of the end grain would have been handy to know the cut of the board and to get a better idea of the grain structure. Given that there are well over 700 eucalypts makes it a tough gig to ID. One thing though it seems to have pretty grain.