Dear Knots Community,
I purchased a set of Hal Taylor rocker plans and wish to make one out of a figured Maple (Curly, Tiger). My local lumber dealer in Allentown, PA has what he describes as “Curly Soft Maple”. Has anyone heard of this and if so is it the right kind of Maple for a rocker? I know about Hearns Brothers but they are quite far from where we are living.
Additionally, does anyone know of a good lumber dealer in the Allentown, PA area. I already know about Bailey’s by Kempton, PA.
Replies
My local mill does carry both hard and soft, but I don't recall
"soft curly Maple"
Curly figure is more often found in soft maple (red maple, in particular) than in hard maple (sugar or black maple). Curly hard maple is more expensive, partly because hard maple is by itself more expensive than soft maple, and also because the curly figure is less commonly seen in hard maple. The larger internet dealers (Hearne, West Penn, etc.) stock both.
Curly maple, tiger maple, fiddleback maple, etc. are all terms for essentially the same thing, although people will argue about how "fiddleback" means tighter curls than "curly," etc. There is no consensus.
Soft maple is softer than hard maple, of course, but it's not really soft; it's comparable to black walnut or cherry in both hardness and strength. Curly soft maple should be fine for a rocking chair. The only place where there is any real concern is in the rockers themselves.
-Steve
Thank you for your informative response. It has been very helpful.
Bear in mind, too, that discoloration is quite frequent in soft maple. If you want that "pure" whitish look of hard maple, you might be disappointed with the look of soft maple, which is often grayish or tan.
Zolton If you see a possum running around in here, kill it. It's not a pet. - Jackie Moon
I have used both hard and soft. IMO Saschafer is spot on.
Comments about curly (or any figured) maple - other posters are correct, the only reason it's called "soft" maple is that it's a bit softer than it's harder cousin, the sugar maple. By any other measure, it's definitely not soft - in fact, it's pretty dang hard.
Figured maple varies enormously in price. The more regular and tighter the figure, the higher the price. Clear, white sapwood is much preferred over pieces that have some of the heartwood in it (the grayish streaks), and so is much more expensive.
I say this because you can't really do lumber price comparisons with figured maple the way you can with other species. It's possible that someone that has figured maple at $8/b.f. is over-charging, while someone that's selling something with the same description at $20/b.f. is under-charging. Generally, you have to see it and do a metal comparison of the quality of the figure with other examples.
Figured maple is also difficult to work with hand edge tools - it tends to tear out. Ditto for powered edge tools that plane the surface (i.e., jointers and planers). You can control this tendency by skewing the cutter's angle across the wood and wetting the board with alcohol, water, or even mineral spirits, and if you're hand-planing, by maintaining a tight mouth and a steep pitch angle.
It does sand, rasp and scrape pretty much like any other domestic hardwood, however, so if you're building a Maloof rocker with Maloof techniques (grinders, rasps, sanders, etc...) you should have no problems. I saw a copy of one of Sam's rockers in curly maple at a lumber dealer a few weeks ago, and I have to say that the result was stunning.
This says it better than I can.... http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3156/is_n8_v102/ai_n25024381
Cheers, DonDon Kondra - Furniture Designer/Maker
Don - While Western big-leaf is definitely a commercially viable species, red maple (that grows in the Eastern US) is what's most commonly found here (in the East) as "soft maple". From what I'm told, most of the curly figure and especially birdseye is from red maples and related species from the northeastern US. I'm not sure it's known as to why this is, though I've opened a few trees in Raleigh NC with a chainsaw lumber mill that had some curly figure. I've never seen birds-eye from a tree down here, but that might be more of an odds thing than anything else - supposedly only 1 in 1000 trees have birdseye figure.
Okay....
Back to the OP's question, I've used soft big leaf and soft is definitely not what I would call it :)
Through a local wholesaler I also have access to what they term as soft white maple which is almost all curly. AFAIK this wood is from the northern central US..
I wouldn't hesitate to use this wood in a chair.
If I wanted truly curly hard maple I order from A & M Wood Products, the color is quite white, uniform and the curl is quite acceptable. They are wonderful to deal with and can send you a picture of the actual wood they will be shipping you.
Hope this helps clear up soft maples bad name, he, he...
Cheers, Don Don Kondra - Furniture Designer/Maker
not intended to hijack this thread but i am starting a project (table)with soft curly maple, how does a person get a decent glue line, run it through the jointer and always get a tearout somewhere in the joint?
Hi Dan,
Sharp blades, light cut, fairly slow feed rate and say a prayer :)
I actually find I get a cleaner cut taking a light pass in the thickness planer... make sure your down side edge is 90 degrees/square because if it isn't, the thickness planer will just reproduce whatever angle it is....
Cheers, Don Don Kondra - Furniture Designer/Maker
A couple of other suggestions (I use curly maple a lot in building Early American repros):
1) Wet the wood with denatured ethanol before the final pass in your jointer. It's quite effective at reducing/eliminating tear out.
2) Make a skew fence for your jointer - you can do this by carefully beveling some MDF or plywood so that the two faces remain parallel, and stick this to your jointer fence with clamps or double-stick tape. Skewing the edge of curly maple board as it passes over a jointer helps enormously to reduce tearout, as does skewing the board as it goes through a power planer.
3) (My Favorite, and pretty much used exclusively): Use a high-angle jointing plane with a back bevel on the blade to clean up the edges. Including the high-angle frog and back bevel, my plane set up for this purpose has an included cut angle of about 60 degrees. It generally doesn't ever leave tearout unless I take an exceptionally heavy cut.
Before you joint or plane curly maple, wet it with tap water and a sponge. Then take very small bites - very slowly from it and wet it as it dries. You can't avoid all the tearout but you can avoid the real disasters
Don,
Is that http://www.amwoodinc.com/canada/aboutFrame.html in Canada or
A & M Industrial Wood Products in Sydney,OH or someone else?
Thanks
John
Sorry, should have included the address, it's the Canadian company
http://forloversofwood.com/
Cheers, Don Don Kondra - Furniture Designer/Maker
Thanks
They look like good people.
Regards
John
From what I'm told, most of the curly figure and especially birdseye is from red maples and related species from the northeastern US.
You're half right. Soft maple usually comes from the red maple tree but birdseye figure is almost exclusive to (hard) sugar maple.
Lee
Curly soft maple is a very attractive "Soft" maple. It would be nice for the seat but too week for the stress of a rocker. Lou Orion (sp?) out by Wellsboro is a good reputable dealer. Good luck!
Depending on price and availability, you might want to find some english sycamore. It looks very much like curly maple, and the figure in english sycamore is much more prevalent than in maple.
Politics is the antithesis of problem solving.
No wood expert here. First off, I do not use maple often but sometimes.
Soft and Hard Maple for what I use.. HARD IS HARD.. Soft NOT that much softer! However much friendlier to work with.. Your tools will LOVE the SOFT compared to HARD!.. In everyday use for the finished product hard/soft is HARD to tell the difference!
Unless you are making bowling lanes!
I wouldn't be concerned about the strength of the rockers since they're a laminated glued up type rocker. I'm building the same thing but since I knew it was going to stretch my abilities I didn't want to waste good lumber. I'm building it out of laminated poplar for practice & a prototype beforte trying it out of walnut.
I am currently building several chest of drawers using curly hard maple. Tear out can be a problem. I solved problem with a Byrd shelix cutterhead. Works great Used it to make butcher block cutting boards with the endgrain showing. Not a problem with Byrd cutterhead. Could not do that with straight knives!
I have spiral knives on my planer and that does good work but not as smooth as the Byrd head.
Definitely take light cuts and water does help.
Sam
Your dealer may be referreng to "Quilted" Maple, that's a figure found in Western Bigleaf Maple.
http://www.kensmithbasses.com/woodpages/quiltedmaple.html
Here are some pictures of guitars made from it.
awesome looking guitars. That's some mighty fine maple, too. thanks for posting
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