Studies on Carving Quality of some Indian Timbers

Keeping in view the need for substitutes of conventional timbers like sissoo, teak, rosewood, sandalwood and walnut, the carving behaviour of eleven Indian timbers were studied systematically under four main carving operations, viz., chiseling, scooping, punching and fret sawing. On the basis of ease of working, occurrence of defects, cleanness of cutting edges, quality of carved surface etc., a quantitative method for comparing the overall carving behaviour with teak is developed and suggested. The results presented indicate that Acer oblongum (Maple), Michelia champaca (Champ), Himalayan species, Cupressus torulosa (Cypress) behave better than teak while Terminalia procera (Badam), Adina cardifolia (Haldu) and Olea glandulifera (Indian olive) behave comparable to teak.