Some interesting information about Pearwood.
As many of us [all of us?!] know the, Panerai presentation boxes[ both standard and special edition], made of pear wood, are beautiful pieces of art in and of themselves, not to mention what they hold inside--the ultimate fruit--the PAM.
>From what I can find upon a bit of a cursory look, it seems that pear wood would be considered generally one of the many "fruitwoods."
Furthermore, it seems that apple, pear, cherry have often been used in cabinetmaking--a number of hits come up on a google-search with the use of pearwood in what is now antique furniture.
One can also see a good amount of fruitwoods, in particular pear wood, being used in the making of musical instruments from flutes and recorders to harpsicords.
I found this link that notes some of the characteristics, notably giving off a softer sound:
http://www.earlymusic.gil.com.au/woods.htm
One of the nicest description of the use of pear wood is from this artist and its use in being "turned."
>From the following link, by artist edric florence:
http://www.healing-arts.org/edric/smnatedpearbowl.htm
"Turned and finished to a wall thickness of approximately 1/16 of an inch with beautiful grain patterns, this pear wood bowl is as exquisite to hold as it is to look at. To create the natural saddle appearance, I started with a pear log that was from a branch roughly 10 inches in diameter and worked from the outside of the tree inward towards the center of the tree. The curved rim is not carved or sanded - it is the natural outside edge of the log. Like much of my working stock, the raw material was reclaimed from a firewood pile by one of my collectors.
The sapwood of pear is pale yellow-apricot, and the heartwood varies from flesh tone to a pale pinkish brown. This piece is mostly heartwood, coming from the limb of a very old tree with slow growth. Fruitwood also is known to "move" greatly in the drying process, and because this piece was turned while it was still green, the resultant warpage lent itself to the aesthetic beauty of the natural-edged shape.
Pear has one of the finest of textures of the fruitwoods, and was often used in making instruments such as lutes, recorders and - because of its hardness - the jacks of harpsichords. In spite of its hardness - equal almost to that of boxwood - this piece is incredibly light in weight. Fine wood turnings such as these are a joy for me to make! "
And lastly, one of the most interesting uses of pear wood is in the art of glass blowing. if you've ever seen a glass blower, molds and blocks of wood are often used to shape and form the molten glass before it hardens--guess what kind of wood? That's right, pear wood:
This is what the site says about the characteristics of the wood:
"It is used in the form of wooden blocks - giving the paper form and this page their names - and in the form of flat paddles and wooden rods, alone and in Pacioffis as well as steam sticks. Normally the wood is one of the fruitwoods, cherry primarily in the U.S. although PEAR and apple are used also. Fruitwood is close grained, lacks sap, and smells good when burned. The wood is used water logged, stored in water and kept there during use, and will commonly if allowed to dry. It is normally transported in plastic bags." [so who's going to set aflame a box to test this theory?]
http://users.ticnet.com/mikefirth/blockspw.htm
