The closet rods I have around are coated but that's a good point about the kind of wood. I wouldn't worry too much about pine but it's not very strong
compared to other kinds of wood, I didn't think they used pine for closet rods? I can't tell from the wood grain what mine are but some sort of hard wood
I'd have to assume.
I had a hard time determining what the rods were made up of as well, so I went to local lumber yard and asked them. They told me that they only had access to pine, but knew of cedar. They said that there may be other kinds, but they were not aware of them.
The one thing I found that you can count on about Balls is that they are consistent about their inconsistentcy.