HARD MAPLE

Hard Maple

North-Eastern United States and Canada(Acer saccharum, eh?)

Rock Maple, Sugar Maple (yes, maple syrup, pancakes, waffles. The whole Canada thing. Oh, geez, bacon dipped in maple syrup- just shoot me now.)

The inside-out hardwood: you, our customers, like the sapwood better than the heartwood. Most heartwoods are the opposite. Hard Maple sapwood is WHITE, at least that’s what everybody thinks. Truth is, the sapwood can run from white to cream to golden-ish and even a bit of a rosy color. But everybody wants white, so that’s what we specify to our mill partners. The heartwood is dark, reddish-brown.

Hard Maple is a hard hardwood^1. Like, 1450 Janka² hard. Actually, it’s not that hard when compared to lots of other hardwoods³,  but it is much harder than Soft Maple⁴, so it’s called Hard Maple.

Regardless, Hard Maple is the big dog in Maple Town and it works in so many applications: fine furniture, cabinetry, flooring. Butcher blocks, workbench tops, gym floors. Handles, toys. Oh my gosh: doors, millwork, handrails.

Maple has a fine, even texture with some waviness in generally straight grain. It’s dense so you have to be careful about burning with high-speed tools. But in general it’s easy to work by hand or with tools. Hard Maple is popular with wood-turners.

Finishing can be a challenge due to blotchiness, follow instructions!

¹Don’t you love footnotes? I love footnotes.

²Okay, Hard Maple is quite hard. The Janka Test is a universally accepted gauge of hardness. Hard Maple is 1450 pounds-force.

³Red Oak is 1220. Alder is 590. Hickory, for those keeping score, is 1880.

⁴SOFT Maple rings in at 750-to-900. That’s an average of a bunch of maples that are grouped together as Soft Maple. But that’s a footnote for another day.