Hey All ,
I have noticed a rather snotty attitude here on this forum in regards to the use of Eastern Red Oak for projects .
QS White Oak seems more acceptable then Red , but folks seem to turn their nose up to Red Oak .
Is it because it was overused and folks are just burnt out on it ? Or is it too inexpensive and available , stable and very consistent ?
I have heard some explanations of the grain patterns in White are so much more pronounced then Red . I’ve used both in QS and Rift Sawn as well as flat sawn and I have seen similar grain patterns in each .The color is very different in White vs Red and stained with the same color they do not look the same .
The rays in QS White do tend to be more pronounced in general but it really depends on the boards you have on hand . I have QS Red oak on hand that has a full spectrum of grain and figure , every bit as much as White .
I do know that White takes a finish beautifully because it is so dense and un like it’s Red cousin it is not ring porous so you get a higher build , more like Maple .
In the last 30 years or so Red Oak has been the back bone or a staple of the cabinet industry here in the Pacific N.W. I have built hundreds of jobs for very satisfied clients .
so don’t be so fast to knock it just because it’s not hot and on the edge
I keep a door in Riftsawn with a clear lacquer finish on it to show clients when they are choosing a wood. They come in saying ” we don’t want Oak we know that ” but then they ask me what type of wood that clear one is , folks are so used to seeing Oak with a medium Walnut finish on it that they don’t recognize it any other way .
I only use Northern Red oak never Southern or Appalachian
dusty ,,,, I like Red Oak
Edited 12/10/2007 11:27 pm ET by oldusty
Replies
Dusty,
I think you hit it on the head... It's just been overdone, and it's very dated. It's the equivalent of the Avacado Green appliances of the 70's. As you said it's been around 30 years as a staple to the cabinet industry.
Personally I think the grain is too pronounced. I had it in my last house, and the cabinets were overpowering next to my relative simple furnishings.
Buster
the Avacado Green appliances of the 70's...I have one. A backup Refrigerator that still works with a large Red Oak cabinet and some Red Oak shelving next to it.
Furniture wise it might be that people are wanting something that stands out from their trim and cabinets. IN this area I see a lot of red oak trim in new construction ( especially in higher end homes ) but more maple and cherry cabinetry. I have built a lot of stuff out of red oak for our home ( I am not a pro woodworker ) but the wife is pretty burnt out on the stuff. She doesn't care for open grain look of oak but I have fooled her by using grain filler so that the stain doesn't settle into the poors. A lot of the low end furniture stores in the area carry tons of red oak stuff that is aimed towards budget buyers and then of coarse there is a ton of of oak veneer RTA furniture that is sold in the big box stores. Maybe that budget market saturation of red oak has turned many off to it's potential as fine furniture wood. I also have a lot of it available to use as I have had 4-5 trees sawed up over the years for lumber.
OldDusty,
I think some pretty interesting things can be made from red oak if one is choosy in his selection of wood, I think to do something different that stands out from the main stream you pretty much have to go quartersawn. I think it's the drab run of the mill plain sawn stuff that people are so tired of looking at.
On the other hand the reason I try to avoid the stuff is because it is hard and therefore hard on tooling and hand tool edges. It's sort of like when people think they can get a better price on a piece of furniture if they request it done in pine which they perceive to be a cheaper material. What they don't take into account is the entire day I would have to spend when the job is done cleaning the pine pitch out of machinery and off cutting tools. In the case of red oak sharpening day comes along a lot quicker and things have to be replaced sooner when working this material.
Most folks still don't understand that the majority of the cost of a well made wooden object is skilled labor. That being the case it doesn't cost very much more to work with materials that are easier to work with and are actually more visually appealing. Therefore red oak gets pushed aside in most situations.
Ron
Dusty
I'll give you my .02. The customers that come to my shop asking me for custom work made from Red Oak are the same folks that want to know if I can make their item for less than what they saw it for sale at Ikea.
It's a cheap wood, and in my opinion, looks cheap as well. That doesn't mean that a lot of very nice pieces of furniture aren't made from Red Oak. They are!! It's just that those same pieces look sooooooooo much better in maple, cherry, mahogany, and walnut.
If I take a ride over to the nearest "Amish Furniture" store, 90% of the stuff in there is made of Red Oak. They've got dining sets and chairs that are screwed and doweled together. Book cases made the same way. Not built to the same standards as custom work, if you asked me. Potential clients that are looking at these sources for furniture inspiration get it in their heads that a "nice" table costs about 900 bucks. ha ha ha....
Ok. So that was 5 cents
Jeff
Hi Jeff ,
I think much of the Red Oak pieces on the market ready for sale (not custom) is probably appalachian lumber and it is flat sawn at that .
I only use Northern Red and it is very different than it's Southern cousins. Primarily I use Rift Sawn and honestly have run miles of cabinetry in Rift . About 6 months ago I needed Oak for a smallish job , my supplier sent me Appalachian by mistake .
The boards were wide and had much color variation unlike Northern I ripped enough to make face frames out of and sent the rest back for Northern for frame and panel doors and such .
The Appalachian is a good reason to not want to work with Oak, it was much harder and more brittle and had more tension / stress on board .
With a clear to light stained finish on Rift or it is imo a sweet look .
dusty
Guys, wouldn't your experience with "red" oak depend somewhat on the actual species? For example, Black Oak, of which I am about to have a few hundred feet saws, has a lower density than Shumard Oak, yet both wold be peddled as "red." I suspect that some of the apparent differences between "Appalachian," and "Northern" red oak may actually be species and subspecies differences.Joe
Joe ,
Yes , they may all be the Red specie but grown in different conditions the further South the faster growing and harder in most cases . True Northern vs Appalachian is a different animal with characteristics all it's own.
We have Black Oak here in Oregon , it is much softer then the Eastern Red species but beautiful grain .Difficult to dry and stabilize .
dusty
As you already know Dusty, I like it. I used to avoid it as I had problems getting a stain to even out on it as opposed to white oak. And I do like oak period... as the character comes across to me as strong and sturdy as a well.... an oak.
I tinkered with it during the summer as I can get a lot of down-fall here and it's just relatively cheap to purchase. I take it beyond the normal sanding point and burnish ending with a 500 grit Abralon pad. Then slurry sand to fill the pores a dye or oil goes on much easier to compliment the grain. And I don't cover the grain with brown shoe polish stains that I see many use on it.
I may even experiment soon with filling with dark paste filler as I have done on occasion with white oak then using a light dye over it. Give's off somewhat of a tiger stripe to contract and can be pleasing IMO. When ask what type wood I used I just tell them that it's the rare "tiger oak" from deep in the Amazon. With a grin of course as the more exotic it sounds... the more people seem to like it. ha.. ha...
Just purchased a 100 bd. ft. yesterday in FAS that consisted of 4/4 around 11" wide and 5/4 up to 9 1/2. Less glue up for me and my supplier will allow you to spend the day going through racks picking what you want. If you don't see it they will send you down the hill to the sawmill and you can pick from there and they will cut it up to 16/4 if ya need it that thick.
So... as you, I like red oak along with about every other species as I can find the beauty in all of them if I don't cover them with shoe polish. BTW.. I don't do ply...
Sarge..
Edited 12/11/2007 11:05 am ET by SARGEgrinder47
I have piles of it and despite seeing it all over the place I still think of it as an esteemed wood. All I have to do is look around and see the large majestic oaks in my area and I am grateful it is around. I agree that the industry (furniture and cabinetry) have exploited the resource and largely put it to poor use. The ugliest example I can think of are kitchen cabinet doors with rotary sawn veneer panels or rotary sawn oak veneer hollow core doors stained dark walnut. No wonder plain folk can't see the beauty of the material for what it is. Manufacturers have been pushing an unappealing standard for a couple of generations and people come to accept what is out there as the norm.
I think Red oak is fine. It;s not my favorite wood due to its pores and hardness. I enjoy working cherry, walnut, maple, and even pine or poplar more.
I think, as has been noted above, given that so many hardwood floors are red oak, folks either think of the wood as flooring or want a contrast in their furniture. I purposefully made a built in corner cabinet for my home in red oak to match the floors! Pic attached:
Samson,
Man, do you hire out for design!? :-)
You may think I'm crazy but I very much like how you combine all the elements in your pieces, especially that corner cabinet. So far I've borrowed several for future projects.
Show me more will ya!
Regards,
Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
Edited 12/11/2007 3:12 pm ET by KiddervilleAcres
Bob, you really are too kind. Really.
There's nothing terribly fancy or unusual about the corner cabinet. We did a rennovation of our house. Inevitably, you get little bits of space that are sort of hard to fit into the larger scheme. This little jog in the hall was one such place. Rather than have a tiny closet there, we decided to make it a "design feature" echoing another arched opening just in front of this one.
The cabinet is very basic - ply inside - a top - a face frame - a couple shelves - standard rail and stile doors and some molded bits here and there (mostly to dress up where the top meets the wall)
I'm not at all ashamed of it, but it's nothing much.
I think it's the lighting - the arch - and the vase with flowers that's tricking your eyes into thinking the cabinet is unusual.
Anyway, thanks for being nice.
As with cooking, presentation is everything. Your cabinet may be simple, but the presentation was superior.
View Image
-Steve
Floors and trim around the house OK...furniture, nahhh...(no snottiness intended)Jimmy
Very nice work!
"I have noticed a rather snotty attitude here on this forum in regards to the use of Eastern Red Oak for projects."
I've noticed a snotty attitude about a lot of things, but there's nothing wrong with using red oak. Actually acording to some recent wood industry statistics that I've seen reported, ash is one of the least used woods right now - even less than red oak. I'm sure that some will find fault with it as well.
Like anything else, taste in wood goes in cycles. What's in vogue today may be scorned tomorrow. I'm sure that there were many maple kitchen cabinets torn out in past years so that they could be replaced by oak. Some of those same cabinets are now being ripped out and replaced by maple. That's one thing that keeps some here in business. Remodeling kitchens is big business for many wood workers right now.
To say that red oak is any different than other kinds of wood does not make sense. Perhaps, because it has been "over used" in recent years some don't want to use it in a project, but to say it is more plain than maple, for example, isn't true. Sure, some feel that the plain smooth look of maple is more pleasent to their eye than the coarser look of oak, but that doesn't make maple a "better" wood to use.
It's interesting that quarter sawn oak has come back into vogue. It is even more coarse than plain sawed oak and was popular at the turn of the 20th century. Yep, that's a hundred years ago. I wonder if it will be back in another hundred years, that is if there are any oak trees left.
Dusty,
My sawmill saws a lot of red oak, but lately the market has soften tremendously and the mill having purchased hundreds thousand bd.ft. of red oak is in a position where the price they needed to pay for the trees is greater than the potential yeild from sawing them down.. Thus they aren't harvesting any. and letting the contracts lapse rather than lose money on them..
Things go in cycles. I used to buy black walnut for dirt cheap but now the price of black walnut is thru the roof and not affordable by me..
White woods like hard maple and birch are coming down now in price as consumers clamor for Cherry and black walnut..
At one time Hickory was screaming in price and today it's barely more expensive than pine..
and so it goes..
Eastern red oak kitchen cabinets to the ceiling with a reddish mahogony color, with a nice laquer top coat. thats what i had.
moved to a new house and got light maple cabinets by some mfg (sh****), and how do i miss my old cabinets.
colors go in cycles, but red oak remains a great wood to work with, imho.
joe p in ri
plenty of Red Oak here.
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled