I’m one of the Breaktime regulars who’s looking for a little help.
Someone gave me some wood about 10 years ago. He worked at a place that had made pallets in the past. And they had a lot of old rough sawn lumber in storage buildings. He had worked there about 15 years, and said the wood had been there as long as he’s been around. So I have no way to track the source of the wood.
Some of the guys have suggested it might be sycamore. That could be reasonable, as sycamore is a native tree around here. (central Illinois)
Someone suggested it could be lacewood, or silky oak. I’ve never heard of those, so I don’t think they’re native. As I understand it, lacewood is imported? If that’s true I doubt that’s correct. If they were making pallets with the stuff they probably bought the wood from a local sawmill.
Here are the pictures I posted at Breaktime. Thanks for any help you can offer.
If flying is so safe, why do they call the airport the “terminal”?
Replies
Boss Hog,
Looks like you got yourself some lacewood (aka Silky Oak). It is imported from Australia.
Careful if you work with this wood. A lot of people do get skin irritations from its sawdust. Not everyone, but a lot of people.
Dark Magneto
I kinda doubt it's imported.
As I said in my first post, the wood has been lying around for a minimum of 25 years. Why would they have a whole bunch of this stuff back then?
Also - This was from a pallet shop. There's no way they would have imported expensive wood from Austrailia to make pallets out of.
I guess it's POSSIBLE, but it sure seems unlikely.Be nice to your kids. They'll choose your nursing home.
You are correct about that wood being sycamore. I have used quite a bit of it. Wherever the vertical grain is exposed you'll get that kind of figure. It does mimic the look of lacewood or silky oak. I actually think that it's prettier in most cases. Some of it is more dramatic than what you are showing here too! It is lighter than lacewood I think (in both color and weight) and very much cheaper in most cases. You can sometimes resaw thicker planks to expose the figure better (I've done that).
This stuff definitely is lightweight. Probably similar to white pine.
As for it being cheaper - This stuff was given to me as scrap wood. I burned a lot of it in my wood stove. Didn't have a clue what it was.If a chronic liar tells you he is a chronic liar do you believe him?
Sycamore
I wish I had more to say!
Boss, that ray fleck looks a little heavy to be sycamore. If you're located somewhere in the southwest, it could be silky-oak (lacewood.) Silky-oak is native to Australia, but it's been naturalized in our arid southwestern states...so, it's not inconceivable a domestic mill down there could have picked some up in a load of mixed hardwoods.
Weight wouldn't be a very good clue, since the density of silky-oak varies quite a bit with growing conditions and both it and sycamore are of comparable densities. Sycamore has an average specific gravity of 0.46, while silky -oak's is 0.51.
The scents of these two woods are very different (hard to describe), but silky-oak has a harsher peppery odor and it can be quite toxic. It contains a quinone that is a potent allergen for some people. The symptoms are similar to those of poison ivy.
I'm not from the southwest, but rather central Illinois.If a case of the clap spreads, is it then considered a case of the applause?
Boss Hog,
Jon Arno is old and the first things to go are the eyes :O
Still looks like a clear case of sycamore to me.
Speaking of cases, I got no applause when I spread the clap to my girlfriend back in high school.
I don't think that is Sycamore. The rays are too much. If it is sycamore, it is the craziest piece that I have ever seen. Why wouldn't it be lacewood. Maybe the pallet was built from scraps.
My vote is still lacewood.
darkmagneto.
That's my thought, too, Magneto. Also, the color doesn't seem quite right. Lacewood is more uniformly light brown in color, as is the wood in these photos...While sycamore produces a rusty brown heartwood, it's slow to develop and typically only the very center of the log displays it. It would be interesting to see if the annual rings on the end grain of this stuff suggests where in the log it came from. But if this is sycamore, and it's been sitting around for a quarter of a century, color wouldn't be the most reliable clue. I still think it's a Proteaceae species. Either Queensland lacewood or Australian silky-oak.
" Maybe the pallet was built from scraps."
The pieces the guy gave me was 1X4 and 1X6, between 8' and 12' long. So this wasn't from scraps.Have you ever seen a toad sitting on a toadstool?
JS, if it's a domestic species, it would have to be sycamore. We don't have anything else with that ray pattern. I guess we'll just have to wait and see if the Boss develops an itch.
>>"Jon Arno is old and the first things to go are the eyes :O"<<
Well, you're half right.
a hint: Pfizer! Better than delta!
I've used sycamore that looks almost exactly like that. That is kind of a busily figured piece but not at all uncommon. Some that has larger rays (but fewer) is even more dramatic in it's looks. I'm sorta your neighbor over here in Saint Louis and sycamore grows everywhere here. it is normally the largest of the forest trees and in the winter it's white trunks loom above the other trees. The indians used to call it "the ghost tree". the Lewis and Clark sawmill south of here usually has a good selection of it. If I were real ambitious I could find a pretty nice match for that in my storage room (SYCAMORE) but I am not that bored yet. It is often used for pallets and other cheap applications. I am not sure just why but it does seem to be prone to twisting cracking and other drying faults. It is not a lot worse than many other woods in those regards though, it seems that it just doesn't have much to set it apart and make it desirable. For those that appreciate the figure it can be a real bargain. I think it might make a good instrument wood too, but I have not had time to test that theory yet. The indians used to favor it for dugout canoes. I think the lightweight and large available size were the main features that they found desirable. It is sycamore Boss.
Glad to hear of someone else from the boards that's near me. I live about an hour northeast of the arch along I-55.
I've bought wood at the Lewis and Clark sawmill before. Nice place. Haven't been there for a long time though.Do medics in Rome refer to IVs as 4s?
I live in the Kansas City area and have seen a fair amount of sycamore like that, too. It was my first (and only) thought when I saw the pictures.
Sycamore makes good drawer sides. It seems to be sort of naturally lubricious, wears well, and looks good. I've also done some furniture in curly sycamore veneer. It looks a lot like curly maple, but whiter, shading to pink. I don't know where the veneer originated, but it sure looked nice.
Michael R.
I worked for an exotic wood store in the early 80's. From what I remember we had some stock that was called "rewa-rewa". Bird carvers used it for the feather pattern. I believe it was a light weight wood and wasn't that expensive. The grain pattern seamed allot like yours. But, that was along time ago. And, we smoked a bunch of pot back then.
We spent many a night after closing trying to make out pictures in the boards of bocote and ziricote. Boy, does that bring back some foggy memories
"From what I remember we had some stock that was called "rewa-rewa""
Are you sure that you're not thinking about "maui-wowie" ?
Boss,
I've never worked sycamore but I've spent a fair bit of time on Silky Oak (US trade name Lacewood). From the looks of it, it could be.
Jon Arno's comments there are correct, but I share your scepticism - but maybe it came up as a part of a mixed pallet from the temperate part of the US. Silky Oak (our Southern Silky Oak - Grevillea Robusta) is a common ornamental tree with bracts of bright yellow flowers.
Here's a simple test that might guide you.
As John said, Silky Oak has a fairly acrid odour - kind of like a sweet pepper smell (similar to our capsicum - I think US name is "bell pepper"). Fresh cut boards reek of it.
Silky Oak (Lacewood) also is fairly springy - you can line a vice with 1" thick boards and then clamp the boards together with a 1/4" dowel between the two jaws - the jaws will mould around the dowel and then (about 95%) spring back to original shape.
If in doubt, wear a dustmask as a minimum and maybe use barrier cream on the back of your hands/forearms. The skin reaction is fairly immediate but more importantly it could bring on immediate respiratory problems if (repeat, if) it's Silky Oak and you get a lungful of dust - it's quite a nasty experience
Cheers,
Andrew
Edited 1/28/2004 8:47:54 PM ET by eddie (aust)
hi eddie,
im from austrailia too and i believe that lacewood is actually the wood harvested from a tree called a london plane. silky oak is from sheoak. i dont mind if im wrong but im pretty sure the old time cabinetmakers from england used lacewood (london plane) which doesnt grow there.
Gassa, the London planetree is believed to be a cross between the Old World sycamore (Plantanus orientalis), native to southwest Asia, and the New World sycamore (Plantanus occidentalis). Apparently, the cross occurred when these two species we reunited as explorers brought them back to gardens in Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries.
The sycamore family (Plantanaceae) is an ancient one, dating back perhaps a hundred million years. It's almost as ancient as the magnolia family and until recent times it consisted of isolated, remnant populations in North America, Central Asia and the Far East. The English refer to species in this family as planetrees, while they use the common name "sycamore" for one of their maples.
The inconsistent use of common names among these woods causes a lot of confusion in that our North American sycamore is sometimes called American lacewood, because its showy rays are similar to those found in the true Australian lacewoods. Australian lacewood belongs to an entirely different family; Proteaceae. While not as old as magnolia or sycamore, this too is a rather ancient family found mostly in southeast Asia...although a few species are native to South America, suggesting that the family was part of the flora of the Southern Hemisphere when Australian, Antarctica and South America were joined (but this is a debated topic among paleobotanists.)
As for Boss' mystery wood, all the evidence, given the source, seems to point to the likelihood that it must be American sycamore...but it sure does look like lacewood of the Proteaceae type. The chemistry of these two woods differ so much that for someone familiar with both of them, scent probably provides the quickest clue. Unfortunately, both scent and color become less reliable clues as wood ages...and the Boss says this stuff is at least decades old. Still, I think once he begins to work with the wood and he gets a nose full of the dust, if it's lacewood, he'll know.
I dug around last night to see if I had any more of the wood. Found a couple of pieces and planed off a bit of the wood to see if it had the same grain.
The grain was the same as the pictures I posted, and there was no noticeable smell. So it sounds like sycamore is the most likely answer.
BTW - In this message over at Breaktime, I posted a a picture of the toy I was making that brought up the whole discussion:
http://forums.taunton.com/tp-breaktime/messages?msg=39320.41
I appreciate all the help you folks have given me. Hopefully I can reciprocate sometime in the future.All persons shall bear arms, and every male person shall have in continual readiness a good musket or other gun, fit for service [Connecticut gun code of 1650]
Eddie,
I've been holding back from this one for several reasons but I feel bound to put in my 2 cents here to clear up a couple of points. You probaby do know, but I'm not sure from your posting if you realise that the 'Silky oak' most commonly used in joinery is NOT Greviliiea robusta. The tree is native to northern NSW/Qld, but had a very patchy distribution, and commercial stands were used up a long time ago. Despite its preferred habitat being places like riverine rainforest, it is remarkably drought tolerant, and has been planted all over Australia, in the most unlikely places. Most of the silky oak of commerce now, is Cardwellia sp from north Qld., but Bootle gives 5 different genera known as silky oak, all in the same family (proteaceae), and all used commercially at some time or other. G. robusta is paler, lighter and softer than Cardwellia, and the rays are generally smaller. Speaking of smell - the smell of fresh Cardwellia always reminds me faintly of vomit, I have to say - not exactly a pleasant association!
I don't know where Gazza is situated, but 'she-oaks up here are all Casaurinas (though the taxonomists have decided some are Allocasaurinas, now). It's a bit different gnawing on a she-oak than a silky oak - the Casuarinas have twice as dense and much harder wood, much larger medullary rays, and most are a deeper brown colour. They are hard to dry in big pieces, (but the common 'forest she-oak' makes beautiful plane totes and handles, among other uses).
The pictures that started all this sure look like Cardwellia at first blush, but I wouldn't bet. I haven't seen a lot of Platanus wood, but what I have seen all had that peculiar swirling of the rays like a couple of the bits in the picture have - Carwellia rays run in long, straight rows. It's hard to get any idea of scale from the picture, so we don't know how big the rays are, but assuming they're 1X4s, the size is about right for average Cardwellia. However, I'm pretty sure Jon said the tree naturalised in southern US is G. robusta (and this is most likely since Cardwellia is a rainforest tree).
Having lived in a few countries and looked at a lot of woods, I'd never bet money on what a wood is just from the appearance of a bit of side-grain. The blokes going for Plane just might take the money on this one. Jon is rarely wrong, but he is usually the first one to warn about id'ing a wood because "it looks like...."
Cheers,
IW
Hi Ian,
Yes, I was aware, but given that the wood is 25 years old and supplied as 'junk' timber, it would have been more likely to be southern silky oak IF it was at all. That's why I included the botanical name to clear up confusion for those in the know. More likely to be the attractive specimen tree if it's in a foreign country.
Out of interest, how rare are the N. Silky Oak (Cardwellia Sublimisis (?)) stands looking now. I recall hearing that it's getting logged out fairly rapidly. Any truth in this?
Cheers,
eddie
ps: For what it's worth, I've never worked plane/sycamore, but it's not S. Silky Oak if you want my bet.
Edited 1/29/2004 5:37:04 PM ET by eddie (aust)
Edited 1/29/2004 7:05:37 PM ET by eddie (aust)
<<Out of interest, how rare are the N. Silky Oak (Cardwellia Sublimisis (?)) stands looking now. I recall hearing that it's getting logged out fairly rapidly. Any truth in this?>>
Eddie, to be honest, I don't know, even though I come from up there, and was involved in a good deal of rainforest slaughter in my late teens, I don't get back to the auld place much now (my day job keps me in Brissy most of the time), but there is virtually nothing accessible that hasn't been thoroughly logged-over on the Atherton Tableland, for e.g. There used to be several small mills within a short distance of the family farm, but they are all derelict these days. I occasionally get small windfalls from my brothers, who are nice enough to think of me when they come across 'spare' wood, which keeps me happy, since I am pretty strictly an amateur woodie now.
Last time I needed S.O. it was easy enough to get in small quantities (couple of hundred super feet) but I haven't tried to buy any within the last 2 yrs. It was one of the mainstays of joineries doing doors and sash for quite a while, up here, but again, I don't know what the current situation is....
Sorry - that doesn't answer your question at all - maybe someone else knows???
Cheers,
Ian
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