Amoora is a hardwood with a beautiful, soft texture and good wood for making cabinets and furniture. Amoora wood looks like dark redwoods from Africa called meranti and sapele or mahogany.
The seeds are big compared to other plants, and hornbills eat the fruit, fly away from the tree, and then spit out the seeds. This is a major way that the species spreads.
Aglaia spectabilis is an evergreen tree that can grow up to 40 meters tall and has a wide, round crown. It can be branchless for at least 15 meters and has a diameter of about 150 cm.
The oil and valuable wood from the tree are taken from the wild. It is sometimes grown as decoration.
Amoora is sold under other names
Aglaia is a large genus of trees with a wide range of woods that have different densities. The Amoora genus used to have a lot of species in it.
Different kinds of wood are often sold under their genus names, such as aglaia or amoora.
Vietnam: Goji nui
Indonesia: Mokken
Thailand: Tasua bailek
Laos: Nuk kuk
Malaysia: Surian batu, Bekak
Sabah: Lantupak
West Irian: Mokken
Vietnam: Goji nep
Aesthetics
A regular, diagonal, and wavy ribbon figure is generally visible on radial surfaces, and tangential surfaces have an irregular curly figure marked with characteristic fine zigzag lines formed by cutting through wavy concentric belts of soft tissue.
Availability
Not commonly exported, availability is most likely limited to locally harvested trees within its natural range.
Pricing
Japan imports Aglaia timber mainly from Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. It imports small amounts from other areas such as Thailand.
The bulk of the timber is sold in the domestic markets. In Papua New Guinea, Aglaia timber is ranked in the Minimum Export Price group 3.
You can expect prices to be in the middle for domestic hardwood. Saw logs fetched a minimum price of US$ 110/m3.
Geography
Amoora grows in Southeast Asia and Yunnan, where it is common in dense forests with red soils and is often grown as a fruit or shade tree.
Amoora can be found in southern India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, the Malay Peninsula, northern Australia, New Caledonia, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, and Samoa.
In general, only a small number of Aglaia species are endemic. However, New Guinea and Fiji have a lot of endemics.
This plant grows in gallery forests, rainforests, coast riverine forests, and deciduous mesophyll vine forests in Australia.
Maintenance
Ease of Drying: Drying takes a long time and is not easy. It takes about 3 months for boards 15 mm thick to dry out in the air.
Drying Defects: People say that resin leaks out often, especially when drying at high temperatures. It tends to cup, bow, spring, and check at the end.
Most of the time, there isn’t much splitting, surface checking, staining, or insect damage when the wood is drying.
Sustainability
This species of wood is not included in the Appendices of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), and the IUCN considers it to be a species of “least concern.”
Is Amoora hard or softwood?
Wood type: hardwood
Usually weighs between medium and moderately heavy when dried and has good strength for hardwood.
Lumber tends to warp or change shape when it is first drying, but it stays the same size once it is dry.
Botanically, softwood and hardwood are different because of how they reproduce, not because of how they look or what they are used for.
Amoora wood stain
There is a possibility that the Amoora wood can be stained. Surfaces of seasoned timber are receptive to applying stain, polish, or paint.
Wood identification
The bark is greyish-white to brown and flakes off in large, square-shaped pieces.
When a blaze, which is a cut in the trunk to reveal the inner bark and wood, is made, a small amount of milky liquid often comes out of the thin layers. It often smells like incense.
The number of hairs on the bottom of the leaflet varies from few to many.
Wood is a porous material. Colored deposits in vessels made of heartwood. A vessel’s tangential diameter is between 100 and 200 microns. Vessel-ray pits are about the same size and shape as inter-vessel pits.
Body ray cells have one row of standing or marginal square cells. The wood can be shiny, and when it’s new, it often smells like a mix of cedar and camphor, sometimes even strong.
Color and appearance
It can be from light brown to dark brown with a reddish tint.
Often, color and weight go together. Pieces that are heavier tend to be darker in color.
In general, it looks like mahogany.
Endgrain
Wood is porous. Deposits of different colors in heartwood vessels. The tangential diameter of a vessel’s lumina is between 100 and 200 microns.
The size and shape of vessel-ray pits are similar to those of inter-vessel pits. Simple perforated plates. Intervessel pits are small, 7 microns or less.
Paratracheal axial parenchyma is thin or vascular. Axial parenchyma bands that are more than 3 cells wide.
Flower
The flowers are small, measuring about 2–7 mm by 2–6 mm. The calyx lobes are rounded at the tip, and their outer surface is densely covered with stellate hairs.
The three pinkish-yellow petals are partially covered with hair. Male flowers are 2–5 mm long and 2–3 mm wide. Female flowers are up to 7 mm long and 6 mm wide.
The stamen tube is slightly shorter than the corolla and has a cup-like shape. The flowers smell good and can be used to make tea or to scent things around the house.
In Australia, plants bloom in February, and from November to February, they produce fruit. In China, the flowers bloom from September to November, and the fruit comes in October.
Fruit
The fruit is about 6–9 cm long and 5.5–9 cm wide, and it has a white latex/milk-filled pericarp that can be up to 1 cm thick.
In 20–28 days, a seed 5–6 mm long will sprout. The seedling’s cotyledons are about the shape of a paraboloid.
Some species have fruit that you can eat and a part of the seed that you can eat.
Grain and texture
Most of the time, the grain is interlocked, but quartersawn surfaces can have a ribbon-stripe pattern. Has a smooth, fine texture and a medium natural shine.
The texture ranges from medium-fine to about medium-coarse.
Leaves
The number of hairs on the bottom of the leaflet varies from few to many. The first pair of leaves are about 10 to 15 cm long.
The peduncle, rachis, and branches are all thick, and the indumentum looks like twigs.
Odor
When the wood is freshly cut, it frequently emits an aroma reminiscent of cedar and camphor and may be rather strong at times.
Tree
It is categorized as a medium to the giant tree and has a potential height of 40 meters. The bole is up to 18 meters tall and 150 cm wide.
Some of the buttresses are as high as 4 meters.
Dioecious, usually small or medium-sized trees, bole unbranched for up to 24 m, up to 160(-200) cm in diameter, and often with small to tall (up to 3(-5) m high) buttresses.
Amoora wood bark
The bark is grayish-white, pale yellowish-brown, or brown and peels off in square-shaped scales up to 30 cm wide. Sometimes there are large orange lenticels up to 3 mm in diameter.
The Bark surface has a few large lenticels and rows of smaller ones but is otherwise smooth or, in larger trees, often has square-shaped scales that fall off.
The inner bark is yellowish-brown, and latex is rarely found in the bole bark.
Amoora Wood Pros and cons
Amoora wood is very strong and durable, but it is difficult to work with and requires much care.
Some craftsmen even call it a “slow” wood because of the tedious process involved in cutting and shaping it.
However, Amoora is a beautiful wood that can be used for furniture, cabinetry, and other projects.
Rot resistance
It varies from species to species of Aglaia and the environment in which the tree is grown, but generally, it is considered somewhat durable.
Strength and Durability
Heartwood is often very hard to treat with chemicals to make it last longer. Sapwood, on the other hand, is moderately easy to treat.
Aglaia wood can be used for many different things. Even if the wood is in contact with the ground, it is rated as moderately durable to durable.
However, some species are rated as not durable and vulnerable to attack by Lyctus and sometimes pinhole borer and termite.
Density – 555 kg/m3, durability Moderately resistant to rotting when fully exposed to the weather, off the ground, well-drained, and with plenty of airflows.
Above-ground durability: lasts between 7 and 15 years.
In-ground durability: Good for 3 –10 years.
Allergies and toxicity
Even though severe reactions are rare, it has been said that wood from the genus Aglaia can irritate the skin and lungs.
Water resistance
No data available.
Workability
Working by hand or using a machine is simple. It is easy to glue, stain, finish, and turn. When it’s first drying, it tends to warp or change shape, but once it’s dry, it holds its shape well.
In general, Aglaia wood is easy to work with. The wood works well with machines and saws, but the heavier wood needs a lot of power to cut.
The wood’s grain is often curly and wavy, so you need sharp planes with fine settings. Surfaces that have been planed are smooth and shiny, and finishing them gives good results.
The wood can be peeled and cut well. It has been said that first-grade face veneer can only be made from a small number of species, but this has not been proven.
Veneer may warp severely during drying. The pulp that hasn’t been bleached isn’t very bright but strong. Dermatitis can be caused by the sawdust of a few different species.
Amoora wood uses
Amoora wood is used in building interiors, furniture, cabinets, veneer, boats, gunstocks, tool handles, and other things.
Each component is high quality and built to endure a lifetime thanks to premium brass hardware, strong joints, and a well-constructed structure.
Amoora wood furniture
It can be used for high-quality furniture and flooring and has a nice ribbon figure. Amoora can be used to make good furniture and cabinets.
Amoora wood can also be used for joinery, such as window frames, door jambs, decorative wall linings, moldings, and turning. It also makes an attractive floor for light traffic.
Amoora for veneer
Amoora is a beautiful wood that looks like dark red meranti and Philippine mahogany.
It made first-rate peeler logs and was in high demand in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan for plywood face veneer.
Amoora Wood Related species
Amoora looks like real mahogany and is related to it botanically. Both kinds of wood are in the Meliaceae family of plants.
Amoora is different from most mahoganies because its heartwood smells good, and its parenchyma is banded instead of being on the edges.
Pacific Maple (Aglaia cucullata)
Aglaia cucullata is a tree with a wide crown of branches that curve outward. The tree provides important timber harvested from the wild and used for construction and boat building.
The wood is traded in quantity in New Guinea as ‘Amoora’ timber. It can be used to construct houses, bridges, and boats.
Bekak (Aglaia lawii)
Aglaia lawii is a tree growing up to 30 metres tall. Agaia lawii is a tree growing up to 30 meters tall. The bole is fluted and also has concave or tall narrow buttresses.
The heartwood is pale to deep coppery red; the grain is often distinctly crossed and generally wavy, forming a regular diagonal wavy ribbon on radial sections.
Aglaia Brassii
Meliaceae is a family of plants that includes Aglaia brassii. It lives in Australia, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and Indonesia.
Leaves 8.5–29 cm long, 4.5-29 cm wide; petiole 1–7 cm, rachis, and branches densely covered with peltate and stellate scales.
Aglaia Rimosa
Agaia rimosa is a shrub or tree with a dense crown; it can grow from 2 – 30 meters tall.
The wood is harvested from the wild for local use as a food and source of food. The heartwood is red-brown; the sapwood is white to orange-yellow.
The grain is often distinctly crossed and generally wavy, forming a regular diagonal wavy ribbon on radial sections; an irregular, curly figure with characteristic fine zigzag lines on tangential sections.