Cherry & Maple lamination question

Nick Bozovich 21 years ago

I need a 3 3/8" piece of lumber for a vice I'm making. I have a 2 3/4" piece of maple and a 1" piece of cherry. Has anyone tried laminating these two wood types together using Gorilla Glue or Titebond? I'm questioning whether they'll expand and contract at the same rate and break the lamination bond, split, etc. I could use a piece of 1" maple, but I like the contrast the cherry gives to the project.

I tried DAGS, but I couldn't seem to hit the right combination of words to get anything on laminating different species of wood. If anyone knows of a site on this issue, maybe you could point me to the URL and I can research further.

Thanks for your advice and help!

Nick B

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Frank McVey 21 years ago

Hi, Nick.

With those sorts of dimensions, I don't think you'll have a problem, as long as the two components are at roughly the same MC to start with. Cherry and hard maple are fairly close as regards stablility. The following website gives the coefficients and method needed to calculate expansion and contraction, so you should be reassured.

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year, I made a tiller for my friend's 38ft yacht. The old one was laminated from oak and mahogany, about 3 ft long ,2 1/2" width reducing to about 1"at the handle, and 6" in depth, reducing to 1" at the handle end, the whole thing having a graceful curve. After many years, it had started to delaminate.

I made a replica in teak and oak, using West Systems epoxy. The laminations were about 1/4" thick, and I made up a former to the pattern of the old tiller, glued the laminations and clamped to the former for 24 hrs. No problems then or since, after a N Atlantic winter and summer.

Go for it.

Cheers

Frank

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Nick Bozovich 21 years ago

Thanks Frank - both pieces of lumber have been in the same space in my garage/shop for 5 - 6 months, so the MC should be relatively similiar. The cherry is Pennsylvania Cherry - it was taken out of the mountains in Central PA, but it's probably similiar to "Black Cherry".

I'm going to do it - the worst that can happen is that I have to rebuild the vice - which means I get to do more woodworkin!!!

Thanks again for the help and the web site -

Nick B

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