What type of wood would work best to build T-rails for dropped ceiling panels?
Andy Rae: A dense, close-grained hardwood would be my first choice, since you’ll want to mill the rails relatively thin, yet retain strength. Any of the heavy tropicals would work fine, such as rosewood, granadillo, pau amaraillo, makore… the list goes on. But we don’t live in the tropics. On the domestic front, hard maple, sycamore, beech, birch, or even somewhat softer cherry would offer sufficient strength, while keeping the carbon footprint to a minimum. Now, instead of using those soulless ceiling panels made from manufactured materials such as homosote, how about using a nice soft, lightweight wood panel? Say, linden, pine, redwood or cedar?
