My first workbench

[ajbell]

Paul

Thanks for the vice fixing suggestions - I think I will
go back to the book and look at all the alternatives.

Andy

 

[Nick W]

Now then Alf, do you mean Poplar or are you falling into the trap of mis-naming Tulipwood. If you do know where to get the real stuff, please share as I'd really like to get my hands on some.

 

[Colin C]

Now then Alf, do you mean Poplar or are you falling into the trap of mis-naming Tulipwood. If you do know where to get the real stuff, please share as I'd really like to get my hands on some.

Dont Craft supplies do it :-k

 

[Alf]

D'you know even as I typed "Poplar" I thought "bet we get a re-run of the great poplar naming controversy of '06" but I couldn't be bothered to look up the latin name :lol: I mean the stuff you can get hold of - American Yellow Poplar, wotsit tulipifera.

Cheers, Alf

 

[Jake]

D'you know even as I typed "Poplar" I thought "bet we get a re-run of the great poplar naming controversy of '06" but I couldn't be bothered to look up the latin name :lol:

Look it up? What, is your knowledge of Linnaean taxonomy really that poor? For shame. I trotted that lot straight off the top of my head, honest.

I mean the stuff you can get hold of - American Yellow Poplar, wotsit tulipifera.

Tulipwood. Calling it poplar is just as much a misnomer in 'murrica.

I ain't jumping off this tiny one man bandwagon so soon!

 

[Alf]

Look it up? What, is your knowledge of Linnaean taxonomy really that poor? For shame.

I feel that shame.

Tulipwood. Calling it poplar is just as much a misnomer in 'murrica.

I ain't jumping off this tiny one man bandwagon so soon!

But my Collins Complete Woodworker's Manual, wot was my first proper woodworking book and all-round refer-back-to bible, calls dalbergia fructescens Tulipwood. Mind you it calls liriodendron tulipifera American Whitewood (as well as Yellow Poplar, Tulip Poplar - perhaps you'll take that one? , Tulip Tree and Canary Whitewood.) Nowhere does it call it Tulipwood. But that's not the point. The point is you tend to remember what you were first taught plus common names don't always have anything to do with what's actually correct.

I hitch my hobby pony to your tiny bandwagon and defy you to drive it somewhere else if you dare! :wink: :lol:

Cheers, Alf

 

[ajbell]

Wot???

I was worried enough about visiting my first timber
yard to buy 'proper' wood; now I am petrified

(that was not meant to be a wood joke)

Just when I had it in my mind to ask for poplar
I am confused again.

Could someone please write me a note and I will
had it to the man behind the counter?

Andy

 

[Alf]

See, Jake? Nick? Now look what you've done! #-o

Andy, odds are if you ask for poplar you'll get offered the right stuff I reckon. But I defer to our learned brethren who can do some work undoing the damage by thrashing out a definitive definition of what to ask for. :wink:

Cheers, Alf

 

[Jake]

I'd ask for Tulipwood, or Canary Whitewood.

I've never heard anyone (except it seems, Collins) confuse either of those with anything other than the one you want.

American Poplar would also work - despite being wrong.

 

[Wanlock Dod]

Although genuine English Poplar is available for free, it tends to be in sizes better suited to turning, and also require quite some patience for the drying. I think that it is probably locally known as Timbrus Combustibulus

Cheers,

Dod

 

[Jake]

As it used to be used for matchsticks, that's very apt.

Fruit punnets, too, apparently.

You can buy it as timber, not that it is anything like as common as the ubiquitous tulipwood, e.g.
http://www.ramsaytimber.co.uk/stock.html

 

[ajbell]

Thanks All

That is all perfectly clear now :roll:

So lets assume I know what species of
timber I want.

Time for more silly questions:

1. Does it come in a standard range of thicknesses
and widths?

2. Is it typically supplied in 8 ft lengths

3. Will it be rough sawn or planed?

4. Is the answer to all of the above "It depends on supplier and/or species"

Andy

 

[mambo]

yep 4. :lol:

 

[ajbell]

Mambo

Thanks

Andy

 

[George_N]

But my Collins Complete Woodworker's Manual, wot was my first proper woodworking book and all-round refer-back-to bible, calls dalbergia fructescens Tulipwood. Mind you it calls liriodendron tulipifera American Whitewood (as well as Yellow Poplar, Tulip Poplar - perhaps you'll take that one? , Tulip Tree and Canary Whitewood.) Nowhere does it call it Tulipwood. But that's not the point. The point is you tend to remember what you were first taught plus common names don't always have anything to do with what's actually correct.

I hitch my hobby pony to your tiny bandwagon and defy you to drive it somewhere else if you dare! :wink: :lol:

Cheers, Alf

Dalbergia is rosewood IIRC.

 

[Alf]

George, yeah, believe so - Collins says Pau Rosa (Jake may not though...? :wink: ) Definitely very different from Pop-, Tuli-, er, the other stuff. More expensive for a start I imagine.

Cheers, Alf

 

[Jake]

It is indeed, but there is a "Brazilian Tulipwood" apparently, which is a member of the rosewood family. If you get offered that by mistake, you are likely to choke at the price.

 

[George_N]

Brazilian tulipwood is dalbergia variabilis, which is of the rosewood family.

 

[Jake]

Wikipedia says Collins is wrong about that Tulipwood too, Alf ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulipwood

So there. If Wikipedia is right, that is.

I almost begin to see why gardeners do use Latin names...

 

[Jake]

And Collins is wrong about Pau Rosa too, apparently, which is, it seems, "Swartzia madagascariensis" or "Swartzia fistuloides", so not a rosewood at all (although pau rosa is portuguese for, err, rosewood).