Cedar?

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Chris C

Chris C

Chris
Senior User
A friend took down a load of this from a room in an old tenant house on his farm. It looks like cedar to me but not sure. Very light weight. Ideas?

(Please ignore the plane tracks. I just knocked the crust off)

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Hmerkle

Hmerkle

Board of Directors, Development Director
Hank
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Chris,
Does it smell?

If not, I am going to guess Gum?
 
smallboat

smallboat

smallboat
Corporate Member
i have some turning blanks that look similar.
Sort of like poplar, but very light weight- almost balsa density.
I rounded them on the band saw this week and there's a slight green stain as well.

does your show any stain?

would sweet gum ever show a stain like that?
 
C

cptully

New User
Chris
Fred,

It seems you have some experience working with sweet gum. I have several sweet gum trees that I am thinking about cutting. Would it be worth having the trunks cut into 8-10 foot logs and having them milled?

Chris
 
FredP

FredP

Fred
Corporate Member
cptully said:
Fred,

It seems you have some experience working with sweet gum. I have several sweet gum trees that I am thinking about cutting. Would it be worth having the trunks cut into 8-10 foot logs and having them milled?

Chris
Click to expand...


UMMM..... you may want to direct this question to Jeff.;) my guess would be NO!!!!:eek: I gave some SG logs to him to test and If I recall correctly the lumber resembled pretzels. It doesn't even make good fire wood! ( burns fast puts out less heat the most firewood and leaves behind a lot of ash to clean. ) It makes great turning stock though if you have a lathe.
 
J

Jeff

New User
Jeff
Better pics would be helpful. A tenant house near Ayden, NC was probably constructed from local wood (Eastern NC).

1. Not ERC by look or smell. Also doesn't look like poplar (no greenish/yellowish markings).

Sweet gum could be the candidate.
 
CrealBilly

CrealBilly

New User
Jeff
Sweetgum is also called poor man's walnut. The heartwood does look a lot like walnut.

The only issue I seen milling gum was you must ensure you mill either sap or heartwood boards. If you have boards with mixed sap/heart the lumber will curl up like potato chips while drying. For this reason the lumber industry refers to sap and heart gum separately. You most likely will not be fortunate enough to find much heart gum because a lot of the gum trees that are harvested for commercial lumber are not that old.

I did find a good use for heart gum, that being for general construction. The heart wood is quite strong and modestly resistant to decay so as long as its covered with something to keep the rain off of it - it should be OK. With its interlocking grain which makes it great at holding fasteners and if braced correctly it could be suitable for outbuilding construction and the like. It's also non-toxic which makes it suitable for animal confinement or shelters. Sap gum however has no decay resistance at all, so its only suitable for indoor use. Its main use commercially is for trim. You may have sap gum trim in your house and don't even realize it :)

Please have a read here ---> http://www.wood-database.com/lumber-identification/hardwoods/sweetgum/


Although hard to be sure with just a picture. I still believe the board in the OP is American Sycamore. God knows I milled a lot of if... Sycamore comes in lots of shades and to produce figured lumber it must be quarter sawn almost perfectly. Most sycamore grows by a water source - thus grows fast with wide growth rings and is not very dense. So the lumber when dry is pretty light. But that is not to say you won't run across a upland sycamore from time to time that has tightly spaced growth rings, is dense and heavy when dried.

Have a look here ---> http://www.wood-database.com/lumber-identification/hardwoods/sycamore/#pics
 
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