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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2004
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    Default What can you use milky pine for?

    I have quite a few slabs of milky pine.
    Today we played around with a small piece.
    It is nothing like pine at all.
    It is a light brownish colour, sort of like meranti not white like pine, hardly any grain pattern and BOY is it dense. It was like cutting concrete.
    Almost impossible for the bandsaw to keep a straight line despite have a resaw blade mounted. I haven't got a decent tablesaw
    Put it through the thicknesser and it stopped the machine. No, I was only cutting 1/2 mm deep. Put it through the jointer and the surface was like silk.
    I wanted to make an entertainment unit, just to last until the white apple we cut down 6 months ago has cured and I can make the unit I want.
    The figure in the white apple (sysygium) is absolutely fantastic. We cut a small piece up and treated it. I cannot wait for the slabs to be ready, patience was never my strangest forte.
    Can't take a pic, my camera has karked it.
    Wolffie
    Every day is better than yesterday

    Cheers
    SAISAY

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  3. #2
    Join Date
    May 2003
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    Kuranda, paradise, North Qld
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    Default

    Wolffie,
    milky pine used to be used for butter and cheese boxes, patternmaking, toys and painted (usually) mouldings. It's not a grat looking timber and tends to have latex veins in it which show up as elliptical voids about 10 -15mm long. It's pretty soft and I'm suprised your thicknesser struggled with it. Perhaps it clogged it up? I've run some through my machines and didn't have a problem.

    Mick
    "If you need a machine today and don't buy it,

    tomorrow you will have paid for it and not have it."

    - Henry Ford 1938

  4. #3
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    Default

    Wolffie, I reckon you've got a case of mistaken ID. Any MP I've encounterd is as Mick says, soft - its alternative name of 'Cheesewood' sez it all. (Forest Trees of Aust. gives the ADD as .44, so it certainly shouldn't be 'heavy'.) You sure you haven't got a chunk of Penda??

    Cheers,
    IW

  5. #4
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    Default

    Here is a scan of the chunk I made yesterday. Sorry the first one is so dark.
    It measures 585x110x60 mm and weight 2.7 kg, so it is is quite heavy.
    It was felled by Cyclone Larry and I bought it as chesewood just to have something cheap around with.
    I have absolutely no idea what Penda is.
    Thanks for helping me identify it.
    Wolffie

    Every day is better than yesterday

    Cheers
    SAISAY

  6. #5
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    Minbun, FNQ, Australia
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    Default

    Common names can cause confusion.

    Milky Pine Alstonia scholaris
    Milky Pine Cerbera floribunda
    Milky Pine Cerbera inflata
    Milkwood Alstonia actinophylla
    Milkwood Alstonia scholaris
    Northern Milkwood Alstonia actinophylla
    Cheesewood Nauclea orientalis
    Cheesewood Pittosporum bicolor
    Cheesewood Sarcocephalus cordatus
    Cheesewood Xanthophyllum octandrum
    Cliff.
    If you find a post of mine that is missing a pic that you'd like to see, let me know & I'll see if I can find a copy.

  7. #6
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    Default

    Doesn't look like Penda (I was just being flippant - Penda is one of the hardest & heaviest rainforest woods around your parts). But it doesn't look like the MP, I'm used to, which is A. scholaris. There are several other species of Alstonia, as Cliff has just pointed out, & one of those may be the culprit in this case. It's not unusual for two closely-related species to have entirely different working properties!

    Common-names can be a right PITA....

    Cheers,
    IW

  8. #7
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    Default

    thanks for the replies
    We just went and checked the other slabs and, yes, they are as soft as butter. This one must have been mixed in by mistake and we just happened to pick that one first .
    Now I will go back and play with my new tambour router buts and the cheap timber.
    Woulld love to know what that piece is though.
    Wolffie
    Every day is better than yesterday

    Cheers
    SAISAY

  9. #8
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Wolffie View Post
    ........Woulld love to know what that piece is though.
    Wolffie
    Firewood.
    IW

  10. #9
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    Durong Qld
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    Default

    Does that work out to 700kg per cubic metre?

    Donna

  11. #10
    Join Date
    May 2003
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    Central Coast, NSW
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    Default

    Is that odd slab perhaps brush box ?

    Arron

  12. #11
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by flynnsart View Post
    Does that work out to 700kg per cubic metre?

    Donna
    It does in my calculations.

    699.3006993006993006993006993007 kg

    Perhaps that is what they used in that commercial with the Trojan Horse that was made from heavy wood?
    Wolffie
    Every day is better than yesterday

    Cheers
    SAISAY

  13. #12
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    Jul 2006
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    Durong Qld
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    Default

    It certainly is pretty wood. The weight might help rule out what it isnt.

    Donna

  14. #13
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    Default

    Problem solvered
    It is Melaleuca aka ti-tree.
    Still have no idea how it ended up among the milky pine.
    Wolffie
    Every day is better than yesterday

    Cheers
    SAISAY

  15. #14
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    Nov 2017
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    Default

    I have 3m/3of milky pine been stacked for 30 years. I no longer will use it. 210mmX 155 x 3m to 4m long plus300x 40 planks.
    Does any one have an Idea of what its worth cubic metre and who might be interested in it?
    Thanks Col

  16. #15
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    short answer is that its worth not much.

    Treated Milky is regarded as about the best fascia timber you can get (being all sapwood it takes up a lot of treatment chemical so is far more durable then most anything else while still being light and stable)

    Untreated its good for pattern making which is a dying art so not much call there.
    Also makes excellent concrete formwork.
    But mostly we sell it for door cores. Again being light and stable lends itself well to being a veneering substrate.

    For all the above uses it has no more value then any other cheap timber.

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