Thread: What are you thoughts on River tea tree for carving .

Any wood that's straight-grained and relatively knot free should be reasonable for carving. Some are distinctly harder than others. Some conifer woods are really HARD when the ring count goes over, say, 50 rings/25mm.

I suggest that you push back the frontiers of the science of wood carving and sink a gouge into it. Then, tell us a story. You said that you cut some. Fresh green or what?

Originally Posted by Robson Valley

Any wood that's straight-grained and relatively knot free should be reasonable for carving. Some are distinctly harder than others. Some conifer woods are really HARD when the ring count goes over, say, 50 rings/25mm.

I suggest that you push back the frontiers of the science of wood carving and sink a gouge into it. Then, tell us a story. You said that you cut some. Fresh green or what?

ta. basically I'm trying to work out whether or not to bother with it as I've never used it before.

I have access to a lot thats green. I've taken a bit home to plane it up and give it some thought.

I've heard one bloke say its very good for carving. ( I have a strong feeling that true just by the way the saw ran through it. very smooth. and not hard (but then again its still green), but theres a lot of blokes in the world.

I suppose I wanted to hear what the carving community thinks of it. But then maybe there isn't much opinion on it because people don't have much access to it ?

I'll get a picture today.

I'm far, far to have access to ths kind of wood but
after googleling it, it seems to be an amazing tree when the flowers come !

Hi Jake,
If it is anything like the Tea Tree here in Vic. it is very hard, when it is dry.
As said, put it in the Lathe, makes great 1 piece Mallets, & other things as well.

thanks .

pretty looking tree. is lemon scented apparently.

hope it doesn't dry too hard.

some pictures of it anyway. 1st picture has a bit of jacaranda on the left (some kind of colour reference attempt)

Apparently the stuff I can have came from an unusually large tree. the piece there is near 200 wide.

To me the river tea had a creamy kind of look to it. I thought it was some kind of myrtle for a bit, but have been assured that it is indeed river.. tea.. tree .

P1010554.JPGP1010552.JPG

We used to use a bit of tea tree, mainly suburban salvage. Very hard and fine grained, not much colour but every now and then a suprise like one that had a clear green line right through it just in from the sapwood. Also one of the best red woods I have ever seen was an unidentified melaleauca from beside main creek road at Dungog.
Beware it is difficult to dry and will twist and crack. I used to lose probably half of the stuff I racked up. Wood from bigger logs is more stable.

Thanks Len,

sounds like not good for carving at all.

appreciate all the help

thanks.

If you get the timber close to the root junction it should hold okay. Tends to split in unexpected place, but slow drying should hold it - or cure in water for a couple of years. That said my best walking stick is melaleuca; Going strong 20 years on.

thanks mate

I've carved 2 melaleuca sticks, both pulled from the sea after some considerable time as drift wood. I have to say that carving them was like carving an iron bar... so much so that I broke knife blades on the stuff, but the result were pretty good. They polished up beautifully. How much these characteristics were due to the time they spent at sea I've no idea.

As I understand salt water curing would work okay until you start to dry it - it will dry too much.