It can be very difficult for the first time timber buyer to get to grips with the choices available to them. Here are a few pointers to help you when buying hardwood.

Hardwood can be any broad leaves tree from tropical or temperate climates.

Temperate Hardwoods

• Grown in climates where trees loose their leaves in the winter you can see differences in the winter and summer growth rings when looking at the end grain. (The winter cells are a lot smaller than the summer ones).
• Again due to the climate these species can vary tremendously from one to another in terms of grain, colour, workability….

Tropical Hardwoods

• Grown in the tropics these still have seasonal variations between summer and winter although this tends to be less obvious. Given a bad name by bad practices in rainforrest management there are important questions that need to be asked about the authenicity of supply to ensure best practices and responsible harvesting of these species.
• At Burhouse we ensure all our tropical species are from legitimate and managed sources throughout the world. There tends to be less variation in the grain and pattern between 2 boards of the same species that with temperate hardwoods.

Cutting lists

• Be aware of available sizes of materials before you get too detailed. Just really in terms of practicality if you specify a worktop at 30mm the available size may only be 1" or 2" in your chosen timber - meaning that you will need 2" material in order to complete the job.
• This will cost you more as there is likely to be a higher unit cost on the thicker material and because there will be a high amount of waste.
• Raw materials thickness is usually quoted for rough timber before any thicknessing occurs.
• A 1" board may be between 25- 28mm depending on the country of origin. It should be possible to dress a 1" board to 3/4" dressed size.

Waste

• On the whole the quality is higher and waste is lower when you buy shorter boards.

Species Suitability

• Consider some species are lightweight and suitable for making canoes- others will sink!
• Lime is soft enough to carve but has little figure or structural strength

Alergies

• Take a note of what happens to your skin when you work with different species. Many people have different reactions to wood/ wood dust and it sometimes vary

Differences of Opinion

• Not everyone who uses wood looks for exactly the same characteristics. Some people seek out knots, burrs, waney edge boards while other what exactly the opposite.