Hevea Timber

squire1

Hi people. I thought I'd post here to ask the experts. Have any of you come across hevea timber being used as a floor. I have come across some at a good price and am just wondering if it is hard wearing, suitable for floor etc. It comes in 15mmx150mm prefinished t&g planks.

I've never heard of it before but I belive it is also called "Malaysian Oak" and comes from the rubber tree?

Thanks

Alun

Hevea brasiliensis is the latin name for the rubber tree. Never heard it called Malaysian Oak before to be honest. It's effectively a 'waste product' in as much as they only fell those trees that are no longer capable of producing sufficient quantities of rubber. It's fairly hard and even grained, but a bit feautureless for a floor I would have thought.

squire1

Thanks Alun, actually it cought my eye because it looks well and has some charachter. It it sort of the same colour as beech but with dark brownish coloured knots in it and good colour variation throughout. The salesman tells me it is very hard wearing but sure he'd tell me it would cure disease if it meant I'd by it.;)

He tells me it's coming onto the market a lot now because of the fall in rubber prices which means that rubber manufacturers are selling off their trees as timber. All taken with a pinch of salt.

Also the "Malaysian Oak" bit came from him too but that could have been another salesman trick to make you think you were buying oak.:rolleyes:

Anyway, it looks like a very dense timber but I just wanted to run it by the experts to see if it would be suitable as a hardwearing floor or if there was any other problems I should be aware of.

Alun

That's interesting what you say about the character. The only place I've ever seen rubberwood up till now is those cheapie salad bowls and the like made out of small staves of rubberwood glued together which didn't look much to me. Maybe when it's cut into larger planks it looks better. It's certainly a quite close grained, hard wood so I'd imagine it's be pretty good for floors.

kadman

Looks good to me ,

http://www.floorwalk.co.za/images/09%20Floorwalk%20Specs%20Hevea%20Oct%202005.pdf

kadman

squire1

Thanks for your help. That link was great Kadman. I'll be able to impress everyone with interesting facts about my new floor.:p