Red Meranti Wood usage and all details you should be aware of
Meranti is a versatile wood with many subspecies, sources and purposes. Philippine or Lauan mahogany is another, somewhat generic term for meranti that is harvested and is available in abundance on a worldwide basis. The majority of meranti for domestic use is imported to the United States from Southeast Asia.
Description
Meranti may be bland in appearance; it has straight grain with few variations. Colored gray or yellow, blending to reddish depending on where it's harvested, meranti ages to a golden brown with continued exposure to light. Meranti is a hardwood. On the Janka scale -- a scale that ranks wood for hardness -- meranti varieties rank between 800 and 825. For the sake of comparison, red oak ranks 1,290. Douglas fir, a softwood, ranks 660.
Workability
Meranti is one of the easier hardwoods with which to work. It easily machines, cuts, mills and sands. Because of a certain amount of silica in the wood, meranti has a dulling effect on woodworking equipment. Steel blades, bits and knives cut meranti with ease, but carbide-tipped blades and tools are recommended for projects on a production level. Meranti has a coarse, fibrous texture with open pores. The straight-grain composition of meranti means it's friendly to planers and surfacers, but a certain amount of interlocking grain can cause meranti to blow out or splinter. Interlocking grain patterns result when parallel grain patterns turn at 90 degrees. When knives or cutters cut across perpendicular grain, it can cause the grain to lift or chip out.
Finishing
Meranti has little or no resistance to insects or decay. The wood is dimensionally stable and resistant to warping or twisting. Sanding with 100-grit sandpaper is typically all that's required before finishing. Subsequent sanding with progressively finer grits yields smoother finishes. Sanding or woodworking dust can cause irritation; eye and breathing protection is recommended when working with meranti. After milling and sanding, meranti readily accepts stain and subsequent top coats.
Uses
With straight-grain consistency, meranti trees produce long, straight pieces of lumber. It's used for molding, structure, furniture, cabinets, window and door trim, and veneers for plywood. Meranti is one of the more affordable hardwoods due in part to numerous subspecies, prolific growing characteristics and availability.
Advantage and disadvantages of various wood
Exotic Hardwoods
The qualities that make exotic hardwoods like purpleheart, ebony and jatoba attractive include close, complex grain patterns, rich colors and naturally oily surfaces. These same qualities, however, also signify hardness, which means extra effort and frequent re-tooling for the woodworker. Moreover, exotic wood sources have become increasingly regulated in an effort to preserve forests, making the wood less available and driving its price up. Thus, the decision of whether or not to use it is often an economic one. Exotic woods are so attractive and durable that they can often be left unfinished, but they aren't for the budget-conscious.
Domestic Hardwoods
Domestic species like maple and oak and cherry are a more economical choice for projects needing the structural integrity of a hardwood. Falling about mid-range on the Janka hardness scale, they are more workable than exotic species, although they lack the rich colors and oily texture. Domestic hardwoods don't weather as well as harder tropical species and usually require a finish to prevent them from oxidizing and discoloring, but this can be an advantage. Their lighter natural colors can readily be altered with penetrating stains to blend with the surrounding decor, and finishes usually add to, rather than detracting from, their appearance.
Softwoods
Fir, pine, redwood and cedar are all considered construction-grade materials. These softwoods are abundant, easy to cut and shape and, especially in the cases of redwood and cedar, weather-resistant. They are at the low end of the hardness scale, however, and they break more easily and wear more quickly than hardwoods. Moreover, knot-free, cabinet-grade softwood can cost as much as most hardwoods. However, a woodworker prepared to consider a few knots and irregularities as visually interesting can stay within budget by using construction-grade softwood for any project, remembering that while knotty wood has a certain charm, it accepts stain unevenly.
Plywood
While not a natural product, plywood is commonly used by builders and cabinetmakers alike. Its laminated layers give it more resistance to swelling and shrinking than solid wood, and its wide dimensions eliminate the need for laminating individual planks to make a tabletop or cabinet. Plywood is easy to cut, sand and finish, but because the layers of lamination are visible on the edges, it isn't suitable for turning or for making structural components of furniture, like legs or spindles. Making a tabletop or cabinet from plywood involves the extra, sometimes troublesome, step of covering the visible edges with beading.
QUALITY OF RED MIRANTI
Dark Red Meranti is sometimes referred to as Red Lauan, wood in the Shorea genus is very commonly used in southeast Asia, and there is an abundance of variety between the difference species: each with different working properties, appearances, and mechanical strength values. Main groupings for Shorea spp.
MIRANTI WOOD INFORMATION
Meranti represents a wood of world-wide commercial importance. As veneer, much of it becomes plywood, plywood paneling, cabinets, and hollow-core doors. Inlumber form, meranti is worked into light structural framing, moldings and trim, and low-cost furniture. Meranti has little durability in outdoor projects.
Meranti is a soft to firm hardwood timber. Meranti is not subject to warping or twisting and is dent resistant.
Light-red and dark-red meranti produce medium-to-coarse textured wood that ranges in color from pale pink to brown and reddish-brown.
WHERE THE MIRANTI WOOD ARE USED.
Meranti is a soft to firm hardwood timber commonly used for decorative purposes such as mouldings, furniture, panelling, joinery and window frames. It is a very versatile and durable timber for indoor applications, and can be painted and stained to match the colour and designs in your home.
PROPERTIES
Meranti, dark red
Wood Type: Hardwood.
Durability: Slightly durable (Can vary in durability)
Treatability: Extremely difficult, Moderately easy (Sapwood)
Moisture Movement: Small.
Density (mean, Kg/m³): 710 (Density can vary by 20% or more)
Texture: Medium.
Availability: Available at specialist timber merchant.
Strength
There is a wide variation in the strength properties of the various mirantis and red seraya due to the differences in density and the number of species involved. Large, over-mature logs are frequently spongy in the heart, the wood in these areas being weak and brittle. Despite the fact that the best type of light red miranti is almost equal in strength to the weakest type of dark red miranti, there is nevertheless on average, a distinct difference in mechanical properties. The average figure for strength and stiffness in bending and compression for dark red miranti is about 20 per cent higher than that for light red miranti; in shear there is about 10 per cent difference, and in hardness, over 30 per cent. The Malayan Forest Service prepared the following table, on the basis of mechanical test results, where the mechanical properties of six other timbers are compared with those for light red miranti, the data for which are expressed in each case as 100.
Meranti is a versatile wood with many subspecies, sources and purposes. Philippine or Lauan mahogany is another, somewhat generic term for meranti that is harvested and is available in abundance on a worldwide basis. The majority of meranti for domestic use is imported to the United States from Southeast Asia.
Description
Meranti may be bland in appearance; it has straight grain with few variations. Colored gray or yellow, blending to reddish depending on where it's harvested, meranti ages to a golden brown with continued exposure to light. Meranti is a hardwood. On the Janka scale -- a scale that ranks wood for hardness -- meranti varieties rank between 800 and 825. For the sake of comparison, red oak ranks 1,290. Douglas fir, a softwood, ranks 660.
Workability
Meranti is one of the easier hardwoods with which to work. It easily machines, cuts, mills and sands. Because of a certain amount of silica in the wood, meranti has a dulling effect on woodworking equipment. Steel blades, bits and knives cut meranti with ease, but carbide-tipped blades and tools are recommended for projects on a production level. Meranti has a coarse, fibrous texture with open pores. The straight-grain composition of meranti means it's friendly to planers and surfacers, but a certain amount of interlocking grain can cause meranti to blow out or splinter. Interlocking grain patterns result when parallel grain patterns turn at 90 degrees. When knives or cutters cut across perpendicular grain, it can cause the grain to lift or chip out.
Finishing
Meranti has little or no resistance to insects or decay. The wood is dimensionally stable and resistant to warping or twisting. Sanding with 100-grit sandpaper is typically all that's required before finishing. Subsequent sanding with progressively finer grits yields smoother finishes. Sanding or woodworking dust can cause irritation; eye and breathing protection is recommended when working with meranti. After milling and sanding, meranti readily accepts stain and subsequent top coats.
Uses
With straight-grain consistency, meranti trees produce long, straight pieces of lumber. It's used for molding, structure, furniture, cabinets, window and door trim, and veneers for plywood. Meranti is one of the more affordable hardwoods due in part to numerous subspecies, prolific growing characteristics and availability.
Advantage and disadvantages of various wood
Exotic Hardwoods
The qualities that make exotic hardwoods like purpleheart, ebony and jatoba attractive include close, complex grain patterns, rich colors and naturally oily surfaces. These same qualities, however, also signify hardness, which means extra effort and frequent re-tooling for the woodworker. Moreover, exotic wood sources have become increasingly regulated in an effort to preserve forests, making the wood less available and driving its price up. Thus, the decision of whether or not to use it is often an economic one. Exotic woods are so attractive and durable that they can often be left unfinished, but they aren't for the budget-conscious.
Domestic Hardwoods
Domestic species like maple and oak and cherry are a more economical choice for projects needing the structural integrity of a hardwood. Falling about mid-range on the Janka hardness scale, they are more workable than exotic species, although they lack the rich colors and oily texture. Domestic hardwoods don't weather as well as harder tropical species and usually require a finish to prevent them from oxidizing and discoloring, but this can be an advantage. Their lighter natural colors can readily be altered with penetrating stains to blend with the surrounding decor, and finishes usually add to, rather than detracting from, their appearance.
Softwoods
Fir, pine, redwood and cedar are all considered construction-grade materials. These softwoods are abundant, easy to cut and shape and, especially in the cases of redwood and cedar, weather-resistant. They are at the low end of the hardness scale, however, and they break more easily and wear more quickly than hardwoods. Moreover, knot-free, cabinet-grade softwood can cost as much as most hardwoods. However, a woodworker prepared to consider a few knots and irregularities as visually interesting can stay within budget by using construction-grade softwood for any project, remembering that while knotty wood has a certain charm, it accepts stain unevenly.
Plywood
While not a natural product, plywood is commonly used by builders and cabinetmakers alike. Its laminated layers give it more resistance to swelling and shrinking than solid wood, and its wide dimensions eliminate the need for laminating individual planks to make a tabletop or cabinet. Plywood is easy to cut, sand and finish, but because the layers of lamination are visible on the edges, it isn't suitable for turning or for making structural components of furniture, like legs or spindles. Making a tabletop or cabinet from plywood involves the extra, sometimes troublesome, step of covering the visible edges with beading.
QUALITY OF RED MIRANTI
Dark Red Meranti is sometimes referred to as Red Lauan, wood in the Shorea genus is very commonly used in southeast Asia, and there is an abundance of variety between the difference species: each with different working properties, appearances, and mechanical strength values. Main groupings for Shorea spp.
MIRANTI WOOD INFORMATION
Meranti represents a wood of world-wide commercial importance. As veneer, much of it becomes plywood, plywood paneling, cabinets, and hollow-core doors. Inlumber form, meranti is worked into light structural framing, moldings and trim, and low-cost furniture. Meranti has little durability in outdoor projects.
Meranti is a soft to firm hardwood timber. Meranti is not subject to warping or twisting and is dent resistant.
Light-red and dark-red meranti produce medium-to-coarse textured wood that ranges in color from pale pink to brown and reddish-brown.
WHERE THE MIRANTI WOOD ARE USED.
Meranti is a soft to firm hardwood timber commonly used for decorative purposes such as mouldings, furniture, panelling, joinery and window frames. It is a very versatile and durable timber for indoor applications, and can be painted and stained to match the colour and designs in your home.
PROPERTIES
Meranti, dark red
Wood Type: Hardwood.
Durability: Slightly durable (Can vary in durability)
Treatability: Extremely difficult, Moderately easy (Sapwood)
Moisture Movement: Small.
Density (mean, Kg/m³): 710 (Density can vary by 20% or more)
Texture: Medium.
Availability: Available at specialist timber merchant.
Strength
There is a wide variation in the strength properties of the various mirantis and red seraya due to the differences in density and the number of species involved. Large, over-mature logs are frequently spongy in the heart, the wood in these areas being weak and brittle. Despite the fact that the best type of light red miranti is almost equal in strength to the weakest type of dark red miranti, there is nevertheless on average, a distinct difference in mechanical properties. The average figure for strength and stiffness in bending and compression for dark red miranti is about 20 per cent higher than that for light red miranti; in shear there is about 10 per cent difference, and in hardness, over 30 per cent. The Malayan Forest Service prepared the following table, on the basis of mechanical test results, where the mechanical properties of six other timbers are compared with those for light red miranti, the data for which are expressed in each case as 100.
