understanding wood
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3:39Understanding Janka Hardness
With over 60,000 species of trees in existence, we woodworkers have an overwhelming number of wood choices available to us. So, how do you choose the right wood for your project? Cost, local availability, color, and figure are important characteristics to consider, and can be pretty easily assessed. Depending on your project, hardness might also…
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6:28Read the Log Before Milling
Milling a log into lumber isn’t as simple as just throwing it on a sawmill and making cuts. Well, it can be, but if you go that route you may not get the best possible pieces out of the log. Reading the log means having a good look at it and positioning the log on…
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9:48Huge Log, No Forklift, No Problem
Good news: I have a sawmill. Bad news: I don’t have a forklift. The platform for the sawmill is about 36 inches above the ground. If I were using the sawmill all the time, I might invest in a forklift or a front end loader, but since I only use the Logosol mill every once…
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6:05Air Drying Wood Slabs
Logs are cut and converted to lumber while the log is still wet, commonly referred to as green, and the material needs to be dried before it can be used in your shop. Air drying wood slabs is a really low tech way to dry lumber. Prep Before stacking the green wood paint the end…
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1:43Red vs White Oak: How to Identify the Difference
Red oak and white oak are in the same family, but have very different characteristics. Unfortunately simply looking at the boards may not give you enough information to tell the difference between the two. And no, looking at the color of the boards won’t do it. Red oak isn’t really red, and white oak isn’t…
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4:34What is Chatoyance?
Like snowflakes, no two pieces of wood are exactly the same. That’s one of the things that makes woodworking so much fun. Like Forrest Gump said (using a little artistic license), wood is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get. It’s so cool to clean up a piece of wood,…
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3:14What is Spalting?
Many woodworkers want to invest some time into understanding wood, which is understandable since we spend a lot of time with it and wood selection is an important aspect to any woodworking project. There are many types of “specialty woods” to learn about, from quilted and curly patterns, to the dramatic effects that can be…
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1:52Kauri: An Ancient Wood
Meg went to college in Ashland, WI, and while there learned about Ancient Wood, a company that imports kauri from New Zealand. Knowing that I was sort of interested in all things wood-related, she passed their information along to me and I was able to tour their facility. What’s the deal with kauri? The kauri…
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