I have some land that has open space that I plan to plant trees on for eventual use in my shop. I enjoy working with maple and was wondering if silver maple is any good. It is the fastest growing of all maple trees but when I read up on them, their downfall as a tree is that they are brittle and limbs snap easily. Would this be a problem as well when working with it in the shop?
Thanks in advance Craig Orput Camas WA
Dunno, but it's an interesting question, so I went googling.
The trees are brittle and disease prone. They really want to be alive, so after you butcher one up for lumber, the stump will continue sprouting for years, wasting your space with weak, useless wood.
This site
Yellow birch gets a 3/5 for growth and a 3/5 for timber value.
White oak gets a 2/5 for growth, and 3/5 for timber value.
Black walnut gets a 4/5 for growth and a 5/5 for timber value.
Well, that lead to a lot of other interesting surfing, but I never quite found what I was looking for. I'm sure there are "so I have some land, what do I plant?" sites out there, but I didn't google one up.
Based on this little jaunt into googleland though, I don't think I'd bother with silver maple if I had a big hunk of land and wanted to plant some fast growing short term harvest timber trees to feed my own shop. Soft maple is the off brand vanilla ice cream of the wood scene in these parts. It's got better working qualities than poplar, and it can be pretty, but mostly it's about as exciting as a trip to the bedding department with SWMBO to pick out new pillowcases. If I were going to grow trees for slaughter, I think I'd look elsewhere.
YMMV.
He might think about liquidamber (sweetgum) or sycamore, both fast growing hardwoods that produce great wood.
Charlie Self "Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good." H. L. Mencken
I cut up some soft maple this weekend for the wife (she's into pyrography) and it seemed to work very nicely. It also burns really evenly and well (with a wood burner- not a stove, though it probably works just fine for that, too)
Aut inveniam viam aut faciam
A group of Vancouver (BC) woodbutchers got together over a couple of weekends, hired a fellow with an Alaskan mill and milled approx 1300 -
1500 bd ft of Silver maple. It was a downed tree that formerly lined the driveway to an original homestead in our area. Woods's currently in the kiln but we've found some fantastic figuring in it and are looking forward to using it. It's not as hard as "hard" maple, but it's a nice wood. Our total price, cut, milled (9/4) and dried will be less than $0.55 / bd ft. Hard to beat.Rob
. wrote:
Well, more accurately, silver maple is _one_ of the soft maples.
Its tangential/radial shrinkage ratio is the worst among commercial maples, and its specific gravity of .44 is quite a bit lower than the most commonly used (eastern) "soft" maple - red maple - at .49.
Of course, it's about as good as it gets on the left coast.
I've used it, and like it.
I was intrigued by a June 2000 article in FWW by Jon Arno, where he states: "Sweetgum deserves better than its reputation as a counterfeiter's favorite. True, it takes stain well enough to pass for cherry or walnut. But it also machines beautifully and often produces attractive figuring."
I had a log milled and air dried it myself. Some warped and checked terribly despite my best amaturish attempt to keep it properly stickered and weighted. But what I ended up with was some very beautiful wood that works very well and finishes really nicely. There is a big difference in the heartwood and sapwood. Most of my log, though large, was sapwood. I believe they also call the heartwood Redgum.
I cut up some silver maple about 2 yrs ago. Air dried it and made a cutting board center, surrounded by an osage orange frame. Burned the rest in the fireplace, great firewood also. Excellent wood for a cutting board center, and easy on knives. Worked well, and is a nice tight grained wood. It is called soft maple, but it's up there with cherry, mahogany, and walnut in it's hardness.
Is silver maple also witch hazel
No, two completely different things.
-- 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.
"Great firewood" compared to what? Poplar? IME, silver maple burns rapidly to ashes, whereas sugar maple burns slowly to coals as oak, ash, and hickory do.
Cherry and mahogany, yes. Walnut, no. Silver maple is only about 2/3 as hard as walnut.
-- 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.
Great firewood meaning it burns well. No, not as long as harder woods like osage and locust, but thick cuts last a good while and produce a nice clean bed of coals to cook the black locust.
Here are the (dry) hardness numbers for each of the above. When I say 'up there', I guess it's implied that it is 'close' to the others. In
2 cases its actually HARDER. In the case of walnut, you are incorrect. It is only lower by 60 lbs of force or approx 5%.Soft maple Specific Gravity 0.54 Hardness 950 lbs
Black walnut Specific Gravity 0.59 Hardness 1010 lbs
Cherry Specific Gravity 0.54 Hardness 660 lbs
Genuine Mahogany Specific Gravity 0.59 Hardness 801 lbs
FPL list silver as .44
Acer rubrum, the eastern "soft maple" is .49. Suspect the hardness is for A rubrum as well.
Rob Stokes wrote in news:rmzqd.243210$9b.60@edtnps84:
Do you have your shop up and running again yet? From the sound of this gloat, you have about 24 months...
Patriarch
I'm up and running again. Finally!! It's not as pretty as the last shop, but it's functional and getting more-so every time I use it.. Thanks for asking.
And no, I don't have 24 months! The wood's in the kiln and due out in a few weeks (can't wait!!). Seriously thinking about making a new 2" thick front door out of it...Craftsman style maybe??? Then I'd have to make a matching screen door and...and...and...
The URL (below) is of a couple of kids gifts I finished on Sunday. Worlds fastest toothbrushing stools :) (roller blade wheels)
http://www.robswoodwork> Rob Stokes wrote in
I'm up and running again. Finally!! It's not as pretty as the last shop, but it's functional and getting more-so every time I use it.. Thanks for asking.
And no, I don't have 24 months! The wood's in the kiln and due out in a few weeks (can't wait!!). Seriously thinking about making a new 2" thick front door out of it...Craftsman style maybe??? Then I'd have to make a matching screen door and...and...and...
The URL (below) is of a couple of kids gifts I f> Rob Stokes wrote in
I'm up and running again. Finally!! It's not as pretty as the last shop, but it's functional and getting more-so every time I use it.. Thanks for asking.
And no, I don't have 24 months! The wood's in the kiln and due out in a few weeks (can't wait!!). Seriously thinking about making a new 2" thick front door out of it...Craftsman style maybe??? Then I'd have to make a matching screen door and...and...and...
The URL (below) is of a couple of kids gifts I finished on Sunday. Worlds fastest toothbrushing stools :) (roller blade wheels)
http://www.robswoodwork> Rob Stokes wrote in
Rob Stokes wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@telus.net:
What am I missing here?
Patriarch
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.