Re: Gloat? & Wood id - File 1 of 7 - top3.jpg (0/1)

[Doug Miller]

My wife works at an assisted living facility and brought this piece home

>after one of the residents passed away. The family didn't want it and the >staff didn't want it. I'd told her that any time you see dovetailed >drawers, you are looking at something that is probably of a better quality. >This piece had been painted over with a lime green color and then painted >over that with white paint. I'm done stripping and sanding the top and the >pictures show the top w/a little mineral spirits on it to bring out the >grain. It looks to me like curly maple but I'm not an expert. It seems a >little darker and redder than the maple I'm used to. Thoughts? >

The top is curly maple veneer over a poplar substrate, and the drawer sides are quarter- or rift-sawn sycamore.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)

Get a copy of my NEW AND IMPROVED TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter by sending email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.

[Casey Stamper]

[e-mail] (Doug Miller) wrote in news:SUixc.6313$ [e-mail]:

Wow! You got all that from the pictures or are you familiar w/this particular piece?

[Doug Miller]

From the pictures.

The top surface is clearly curly maple, probably sugar maple from the color, but possibly some other species of maple such as silver or red maple.

That it is a veneer is obvious from one of the photos showing that the top is made of several edge-joined boards whose joints bear no relationship to the grain of the top.

The obvious green color of at least one of those boards forming the core of the top can mean only one thing: tulip poplar. Furthermore, poplar is commonly used as core material for veneering in medium-priced furniture.

Finally, the drawer sides... I've worked with enough sycamore to know what it looks like, and that's definitely sycamore. Color, grain pattern, even the hint of blue-gray discoloration -- it all points to sycamore, specifically quartered or riftsawn (there's a distinct difference in grain pattern as compared to flatsawn). On top of all that, drawer sides is (or used to be) one of the most common uses for sycamore lumber.

-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)

Get a copy of my NEW AND IMPROVED TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter by sending email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.

[Casey Stamper]

[e-mail] (Doug Miller) wrote in news:Wylxc.6435$ [e-mail]:

Thanks for all the information. I wasn't really thinking or observing too closely - I might have caught those details a little better. I noticed everything you pointed out but didn't put it all together.

[John B. Dykes]

It was made by a man, I'd say aged 46 years old - He stopped smoking 7 years prior to making this piece and spent his earlier years as a mechanic in the Navy. From the scat collected around the piece, he was fond of corn.

And yes, he walked with a limp...

Honestly, I believe Doug implicitly and am only mocking my own ignorance.

jbd Denver

[Joe Tylicki]

Doug Miller is the Quincy of Woodworking

Joe