Wood Properties

Choosing a wood species can often be overwhelming.  Forest Floors of Holland tries to simplify your choices by laying out what to look for when choosing a wood species.  For most people color is the most important, but after that one needs to look at the hardness and stability.  The last thing you want is to invest a lot of money into floors that are too soft for your daily needs or floors that are going to shrink up after a few years of Michigan summers.

Wood’s hardness is measured by the Janka hardness test.  You will see the numbers listed in the table below.  The higher the number the harder the wood.

Wood’s dimensional stability is measured by the Dimensional Stability Test.  Here the lower the number the better.

Species Janka Hardness Scale Dimensional Stability Scale
Red Oak 1290 8.6
White Oak 1360 10.5
Maple (Hard or White) 1450 9.9
Hickory 1820 8.9

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