Hardwood & Clear Grade Softwood Timber Suppliers

SPECIES



Smee Timber Ltd is established as one of Britain's leading and most comprehensive hardwood importing and manufacturing companies, offering an enormous choice of timber to manufacturers and users.

 

 

 

Products

 

Hardwoods:

Clear Grade Softwoods:

Machined Timber Profiles:

Flooring:

 

 

 

 

Utile

TROPICAL HARDWOOD

 Utile Timber

Family:

 Meliaceae

Latin Name:

 Entandrophragma utile,

Distribution:

 West and East Africa.

Uses:

 Furniture and cabinetmaking, counter tops, high-class exterior and interior joinery, flooring, boat building and planking, musical instruments, sports good, and general construction work. Selected material used for plywood manufacture and sliced for decorative veneers.

General Description:
The heartwood matures from a pink-brown when fresh cut to deep red-brown. The grain is interlocked to rather irregular, producing a wide irregular striped figure on quartered surfaces. Weight varies from 550-750 kg/m3 (34-47 lb/ft3), but averages 660 kg/m3 (41 lb/ft3); specific gravity .66. Texture, uniformly moderate.  

Mechanical Properties:
This heavy density wood has only medium bending strength, and a high crushing strength with low stiffness and resistance to shock loads. It has a very poor steam bending classification as it buckles severely.  

Seasoning:
The wood dries fairly rapidly with a tendency for twisting to occur. If allowed to dry moderately slowly the degrade is not severe. Original shakes tend to extend. There is medium movement in service.  

Durability:
The wood is durable; the sapwood liable to attack by powder post beetle, and the heartwood is moderately resistant to termites in West Africa. It is extremely resistant to preservative treatment and resistant to decay.  

Other Names:

Tshimaje rosso (Zaire); mebrou zuiri (Ivory Coast); kosi-kosi (Gabon); afau-konkonti (Ghana).