Dulled blades by this wood

[Bill Sutherland]

I’ve got a bunch of pallets that I cut up to make a outdoor “Workbench” and yesterday I was running one of the shorter pieces through my Ridgid jointer and ended up with some really dull blades. What the heck to they make these pallets with. Nailing into the pallets was really difficult and drilling was also a pretty good challenge. My blades were sharp but wow this stuff is tough.

[Gerry Grzadzinski]

Was the wood dirty? Dirt can ruin blades in a hurry.

[Mark Mallia]

Or possibly minerals in the wood from the tree drinking hard water.

[Bill Sutherland]

No the wood was pretty clean.

[Cody Colston]

Pallet wood, depending on where the pallets came from, can be just about anything. You probably got a piece of high silica content wood...something like Teak, perhaps.

[peter gagliardi]

Could be anything. You probably don't even know if this is a domestic or foreign pallet? I ask, because foreign pallets are frequently made of some low grade, but otherwise precious woods- i have scavenged purpleheart , teak, and even ipe from some. There are many woods that are quite abrasive- teak being high on that list due to the silica content.
Domestic woods are fewer that are abrasive, but locust comes to mind.
Any pics?

[Andrew Hughes]

I wonder if it was Apitong.Is it reddish brown?.Its very dense,and harder than Chinese arithmetic.

[Bill Sutherland]

I'll see if I can get some pictures of f what it looks like. When I used the pallets to make my outdoor workbench I could hardly drive a nail into it. Makes for a great outdoor workbench.

[Bill Sutherland]

IMG_2594.JPGThis is the tough little bugger.

[Allan Speers]

^ That surely does resemble Teak.

[Bill Sutherland]

A few guys on another forum said they thought maybe Red Oak.

[Jim Becker]

If it is teak, that could 'splain things...teak has a bit of silica in it and it's murder on cutting edges.

[Bill Sutherland]

I have a Ridgid Jointer and it now needs blades sharpened. I guess that may be good because I have a Edge Pro that has the attachment for jointer blades so we'll see how well it works.

[Mike Henderson]

If you got teak, you got a deal, even with the dulled blades. Around here teak is extremely expensive.

Mike

[Ronald Blue]

Looks like red oak to me and oak is a commonly used pallet wood in the U.S. But they are often whatever junk wood is abundant in an area. Some pallets are barely adequate to survive one use and some are built well enough to be used repeatedly.