What is the best wood for CNC carving

Last updated on January 27th, 2022 at 10:31 pm

Where to buy wood for CNC

You can buy from:

• https://www.probotix.com/MATERIALS/CNC-WOOD-BLANKS
• https://www.woodcraft.com/
• https://www.thecncshop.com/
• Your local lumberyard.

Research the manufacturer to buy wood with stability and high quality. Look for professional purchase advice before purchase and provide the CNC router that suits your projects. Prices are constantly changing, and compare prices and look for promotions. Get the best possible hardware. The Best CNC Wood Carving Machines on the market will help.

Best wood for CNC relief carving

Poplar

Poplar is an ideal wood for carving. It is affordable, easy to find, and stains better. Poplar is great for wood carving due to its grain texture. Soft Maple can be a good choice, although it comes at a steeper price, and it looks great when finished. 

There is uniformity in the straight grain that makes the wood easy to cut. It is durable, and that means it holds intricate designs well. The wood is tight-grained, and that is ideal for CNC work. Hard maple is light-colored and gives a glazing finishing to your item.

Walnut

Walnut is a popular wood type, although it costs more than aspen and basswood. For better results, carve using sharp tools and a mallet. It is rich in color and grain. What made it popular for woodcarving is the wide range of products, including furniture and gunstocks. 

It comes with a gorgeous, rich, dark chocolate-brown color and unique grain and pattern. Walnut takes detail and carving tools excellently, and it helps you achieve a display of splendor in your wood carving.

Mahogany

Mahogany is a robust reddish-brown wood with even pores and lovely rings, making it work well for carving. Mahogany is complex, and the processing furniture from the wood requires accuracy to the wood CNC router machine. 

The production of mahogany furniture requires a wood CNC router with large, powerful, and high engraving precision. The wood CNC router with rotary for circular or round wood carving can be the best choice for the wood. Look for high-quality and high-precision wood CNC router machines with customized service.

Beech

Beechwood is bearable to carve, although it is hard. It comes with markings in the grain caused by a fungus present in the wood. As much as this brings markings to your final project, you can use that to your advantage. These make lovely patterns in your spoon. Beechwood is strong and heavy, and the grain is straight, tight, and fine. It has an even texture that yields appealing items. 

Ash

You may find ashwood user-friendly if you have more wood carving experience and when you are looking to carve something at the paler end of the color spectrum. It comes with a straight grain and creamy-white-to-light-brown color, making it a solid wood carving wood. 

This wood is also ideal for carving faces and small sculptures that require fine grain, which will not affect the beauty of the work. Grey Ash is an Ash version with soft, light brown wood that is more brittle than linden, and the grain is very pronounced and identical to that of oak.

Cherry

Cherry is a flawless wood to carve. It has a straight, uniform grain and even texture. It has beautiful pinkish-brown tones that add to its appeal and suitability for wood carving. Cherry is an all-around wood for workability. 

It is used for cabinetry, fine furniture, flooring, interior millwork, veneer, turned objects, and small wood items. It comes with stability and straight grain. Beware of blotchy results since it is not that good for staining. Use a sanding sealer before staining or a gel-based stain. 

Heartwood is durable and resistant to decay. It has a mild, distinctive scent when being worked when it comes to odor. There is an exception of figured pieces with curly grain patterns.

Elm

Elmwood has a light to medium reddish-brown color. It is a hardwood with a softer side in the hardwood spectrum, and that is why it is called soft hardwood. Bear in mind that it tears out easily when cutting across the grain. 

Make sure not to use a low-powered spindle for cutting Elmwood. It makes furniture, cutting boards, decorative paneling, bats, and hockey sticks.

Maple

It is one of the hardest woods available, and its durability has made it possible. Maple wood is for making items that take high traffic. It makes desks, workbenches, and pavers for floors. It is also for making butcher blocks which is a testament to its hardness. Maple woods do not require fillers for finishing after machining, unlike most other woods.

Oak

Oak is also a popular wood for carving, with multiple features that make it ideal. It is a strong and sturdy wood with a highly defined grain, making good furniture. Oak’s grain is more coarse than lime wood, making variations of oak ideal for larger pieces than highly intricate work. 

It is a versatile, beautiful hardwood for carving beautiful and complex items. It comes with strength, sturdiness, and good workability. If you are working on projects on the bigger side, like interior or exterior furniture, you might go for it. 

Pine

Pinewood has a lighter pale color and is lightweight, and it neither shrinks nor cracks easily, and it holds its form. It is softwood but remains hard enough to make it difficult for machining, and the hardness makes it difficult for detailing work and carving. 

That is not an issue if you are using powerful carving machines. If you want to control splintering, reduce the length of cuts when working with pine wood. Use faster spindle speeds on pinewood than you use on hardwoods for drilling and routing applications.

Fir

Firwood is easy to work with and comes with a consistent pattern. It comes with excellent durability compared to other hardwoods, and it has a moderate blunting effect on cutters. Although it is softwood, you can use it for projects that require hardwoods like furniture and flooring.

Yew

Yew has a uniform and unpredictable grain pattern, and it is flexible even after drying and is much denser than pine wood, and it does not have the same properties found in evergreen wood, such as pine. What makes it a popular wood is the uniform but unpredictable grain pattern. 

It is flexible even after drying and much denser than pine wood. That is why it is in several small items. It creates small decorative carved items.

Red Oak

Red oak makes beautiful pieces due to its beautiful rays. The grain can be problematic for carvers, but it takes decent detail. However, it is not as good at complex projects as basswood and cherry. It lasts nicely, and the blanks are in beautiful pre-glued, grain-matched heartwoods. It is porous to the extent that it blows bubbles in the water.