What wood is this, came from a fence

[johnjohnmulley]

Probably easy task since I know where it came from.. an old fence.

its about 12mm thick this piece and 75ish wide if that helps

I've been looking in the cabots and feast watson catalogues at pics and descriptions of woods, initially i thought it was Brush Box, but since I've been looking at it, it looks more like a tallowwood, or spotted gum (are there more than one type?) or Merbau (but it doesn't have those yellow specks that merbau seems to have according to the catalogues.

anyone got any ideas..

From left to right the stains are polyurethane, pale boiled linseed oil, and linseed oil..... dunno if that helps either.....



If you know what type of wood it is, can you also explain if its easy to work with, or hard, easy to glue ...... alright for making some small shelves out of.......

thanks alot in advance.

[funkychicken]

Ironbark?

[ficfac]

it's looking a bit like spotted gum. If so, it's quite waxy and needs to be glued fairly quickly after cutting/working. Also it will be hard and heavy and your machines won't like it very much It generally comes up quite well with a fine-tuned handplane.

[johnjohnmulley]

Thanks both of you

anyone else confirm one or got any other opinions?

The feels a bit heavy but not terribly heavy. I haven't really felt many 'heavy' woods, but comparing to pine etc its a bit heavier i'd say but not that much heavier.

I just tried gluing it last night after i planed the edges and today I cannot break it apart so it must have glued pretty strong... (does that help)

Here are another two pics.. click on to make larger.

[weisyboy]

spottrd gum.

tallowwood is white/yellow. not red enough for ironbark.

[WVB]

looks a bit like kapur and this is used for fencing timber etc.
but if its waxy its a fair bet on spotted gum or blackbutt

[orraloon]

Spotted gum I reckon.

[percy seadog]

My first thought on looking at the enlarged 'photos was brigalow. Perhaps not quite dark enough. When plentiful this was used for farm fencing and farm buildings out west of Brisbane. Even when aged it still continues to "work", oils up beautifully, Nice timber for feature items where dimensional stability is not critical.