Tulipwood Uses, Types, Properties, Advantages, and Disadvantages
We will explain about 2 types of Tulipwood, Poplar Tulip (Liriodendron tulipifera) and Brazilian Tulipwood (Dalbergia decipularis).
Tulip Poplar, also known as Yellow Poplar or American Tulipwood, the tree is 130-160 ft tall and 6-8 ft in diameter. The distribution of the tree is in the Eastern United States.
While Brazilian Tulipwood has a shorter tree height, which is 20-30 ft tall, less than 1 ft in diameter, and the distribution is Northeastern Brazil.
What is Tulipwood?
Brazilian Tulipwood has a variety of colors, red, yellow, brown, and black. The color combinations are stunning and can be used for high-grade wood products.
While the Tulip Poplar tends to be yellowish to light brown and has straight grains.
Brazilian has poor resistance to rot, while Tulip Poplar heartwood is considered durable enough to not durable.
The other properties also have some differences.
The properties of Tulipwood
Tulip Poplar is yellowish to light brown with uniform, straight grains.
The heartwood is resistant to rot, durable enough to not durable, and susceptible to insect attack.
It’s a very easy to work, cheap, and odorless wood.
Brazilian Tulipwood has an exotic appearance with a variety of colors.
This wood has poor resistance to decay and tends to be difficult to work.
Tulipwood advantages and disadvantages
Appearance: Brazilian Tulipwood has exotic and varied colors, and Brazilian tend to be straight grains; this is an excellent advantage.
That’s why we think Brazilian is good for high-grade wooden objects like fine furniture and others.
While the appearance of the Tulip Poplar is rated lower and tends to be ordinary, but the wood can still produce beautiful art if appropriately processed.
Durability: Both are unreliable in their resistance to decay. Brazilians have poor resistance to it. While the Tulip Poplar is only considered durable enough to not durable.
However, Brazilian Tulipwood is resistant to insects, and that’s good news. This is not for the Tulip Poplar, which is susceptible to insect attacks.
All of that may also depend on the shape, heartwood, lumber, or finished goods.
Workability: Brazilian has a high density, so this wood tends to be difficult to work. Moreover, this wood can give the cutter a blunt effect and can be difficult to glue because of its high density and natural oils.
While the Tulip Poplar is very easy to work, some things may become obstacles during the process, such as softness and low density. It’s recommended to use fine sandpaper.
Pricing: Tulip Poplar is in the low price range for domestic United States hardwoods, especially where it grows naturally in the eastern United States.
This is an advantage for Tulip Poplar because Brazilian Tulipwood is maybe very expensive.
The costs that must be incurred may be equivalent to other rare exotics in the Dalbergia genus.
Brazilians are also rarely available as boards.
Health risk: Both have fairly similar health risks, it’s skin, eye, and respiratory irritation reactions.
Although Tulip Poplars are also reported to have asthma-like symptoms, Although severe reactions are rare, they are noteworthy.
It’s better to prevent by implementing some health and safety protocols when working, such as closed clothing, quality tools, and others.
Tulipwood for veneer
Tulip Poplar and Brazilian Tulipwood are commonly used as veneers.
Although we think it’s a bit redundant to use Brazilian for that.
But the beautiful appearance of the two is great for veneers, although the paint-coated option is doable.
It seems that the process of making Brazilian is quite difficult, including this one, unlike the Tulip Poplar, which is easy to work within almost anything.
Tulipwood for fine furniture
You can see the exotic and perhaps quite rare Brazilian Tulipwood.
Then think to make fine furniture from it. That seems like a really good idea.
Brazilian Tulipwood seems very expensive in the market, especially if you use it as the right fine furniture.
However, this wood tends to be difficult to work with.
It looks like you have to spend a lot of energy and time to find and work.
Tulipwood for inlay
It looks like the artistic look of Brazilian Tulipwood is good enough for inlays.
That will be great art to the final inlay. However, it seems like you will get some problems during the work process.
Because I previously said that this wood tends to be difficult to work. We hope you can handle it.
While Tulip Poplar doesn’t seem like a good idea, we think this wood is not commonly used for that.
Tulipwood for marquetry
Exotic woods like Brazilian Tulipwood are great for this. The varied colors will make a beautiful impression on the marquetry.
It may be a decorative pattern, design, or image that can be quite expensive to expensive.
As for the Tulip Poplar, we don’t think it’s great for marquetry.
The wood looks ordinary; Although the color is quite good, it’s not like Brazilian Tulipwood.
Tulipwood for musical instruments (percussion)
We found information that Brazilian Tulipwood is commonly used as percussion.
It seems like this wood is good for that. In addition to providing beauty in music, Brazilian Tulipwood will also display its beauty as exotic wood.
However, we did not find any information for other musical instruments.
Similarly, no information was found about the Tulip Poplar for musical instruments.
Tulipwood for turned objects
You can use Brazilian Tulipwood wood to create turned objects. It seems like that would be great.
We’ve also seen the Brazilian Tulipwood bowl, and it’s so beautiful.
The color combination gives an impressive impression with a fascinating grain figured.
While there’s no found information on Tulip Poplar for turned objects, it seems pretty good for it.
But I don’t know; please try it.
Tulipwood for pallets
Tulip Poplar is in the low price range in the market.
Maybe that’s the reason this wood is commonly used for pallets. That seems to be a perfect thing for cheap hardwood.
The production of pallets doesn’t require high-quality wood at a high price.
Because pallets are usually complementary to make it easier and secure to store boxes in shipping, But there may be other functions of pallets.
Tulipwood for plywood
Tulipwood commonly used for this is Tulip Poplar. The wood is cheap and easy to work with.
Therefore, it’s a good choice, although soft and low density.
We are not thinking of using Brazilian Tulipwood as plywood.
The wood seemed too valuable for this, and it tends to be difficult to work.
Tulipwood for pulpwood
Another use of Tulip Poplar is pulpwood.
The wood seems to meet the specifications for the paper. Although maybe not as good quality as birch and eucalyptus.
We did not find any information on Brazilian Tulipwood for this.
Because it seems this wood is too expensive and not suitable for it.
Types of Tulipwood
Tulip Poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera)
In other names as yellow poplar or American whitewood, Tulip Poplar is good wood for many things, and it’s cheap.
In addition, this wood is also easy to work in almost anything, including hand tools and machines.
It looks pretty good, although it doesn’t look very appealing.
The resistance of the heartwood to decay is durable enough to not durable. This wood is also susceptible to insect attack.
Brazilian Tulipwood (Dalbergia decipularis)
Brazilian Tulipwood is an exotic wood of great value and may be very expensive.
It has a varied color with unique grain, low decay resistance, is resistant to insect attack, mild-fragrant odor when worked, and tends to be difficult to work.
This wood is commonly used for fine furniture, inlays, marquetry, and others. Tulip Poplar and Brazilian Tulipwood are not in the same genus.
Both also have their advantages and disadvantages. For example, Tulip Poplar is cheap, and Brazilian Tulipwood may be expensive.
You can use the wood as needed. However, it seems that Brazilian Tulipwood should not be used in large quantities.
Tulip Poplars tend to be free to use as long as there are quantities still abundant.
