Why don't we use more Chestnut?

[HexusOdy]

I'm puzzled why we don't use more chestnut in the UK? If anything, it should be our go to timber.

It's 80% the strength of oak but 66% the dried weight. It grows much faster than oak so can be harvested much quicker and thus be much cheaper. It has a low sapwood percentage. It dries faster than oak and most other hardwoods. It's legendary outdoors. It has a nice colour and grain pattern. It mills and stains easily. Through Italy and France they often used Chestnut as we use oak for framing buildings.

Yet trying to find it in board lengths is tough and it's nearly as expensive as oak.

As UK woodworkers it should be our go to timber as Maple is in the US. Yet it seems to be grown almost exclusively coppiced for fencing and firewood.

 

[Jarno]

I wonder how feasible it'll be to find bigger boards in the future, at least in NL a lot of the trees succumb to chestnut blight. But it is a lovely wood, I think historically, it was used for furniture a lot.

 

[isaac3d]

I'm puzzled why we don't use more chestnut in the UK? If anything, it should be our go to timber.

It's 80% the strength of wood but 66% the dried weight. ....

I'm assuming you're referring to sweet chestnut (Castenea sativa) rather than horse chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum). Not sure what you mean by the strength comment.
You have a good point about availability. Whilst it is available it's not particularly common these days. Perhaps it should be.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I think he wrote wood instead of oak. I've seen a fair bit of oak "utility" furniture from WW2 that was part (usually an unseen part) chestnut.

 

[HexusOdy]

I think he wrote wood instead of oak. I've seen a fair bit of oak "utility" furniture from WW2 that was part (usually an unseen part) chestnut.

I did, brain fart. Fixed.

 

[HexusOdy]

I'm assuming you're referring to sweet chestnut (Castenea sativa) rather than horse chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum). Not sure what you mean by the strength comment.
You have a good point about availability. Whilst it is available it's not particularly common these days. Perhaps it should be.

Sure. Horse chestnut is crap. It doesn't deserve the name.

Sweet chestnut is a superb wood grows abundantly here and I just don't get why it's not out go to wood. There's nothing it couldn't be used for.

We will never lose our love of oak but Chestnut could be used for practically anything including fine furniture, internal and external doors, window frames, all outdoor projects including decking etc

Why are we importing Sapele or Iroko from Africa to make frames or gates when European Sweet Chestnut would do both well? Yet I could go pick up Sapele in 15 minutes, but couldn't find a decent board of Chestnut within 100 miles.

 

[rogxwhit]

Much of the timber trade is mysterious. And the impetus of commerce doesn't synchronise very well with the time it takes (hardwood) trees to grow to planking size. Someone has to plant and start to manage a product that will only come to market beyond their lifetime. There were Victorian landowners who thought in terms of posterity, but these days forestry is more in the scope of hedge fund managers who want a quick fix. I don't have an answer to that.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

There was a case in NZ of a farmer planting hardwood trees as a cash crop. He waited the 30 or 40 years, then announced they were to come down. The authorities immediately put a protection order on them, banning him from felling them. He burned them down.

 

[BucksDad]

Yes the timber trade appears to be very mysterious. Does anyone know when/if the supplies of various common hardwoods are expected to run out?

 

[rogxwhit]

It will always be in flux as a result of supply & demand, legal / illegal logging, trade agreements, and going forwards, climate change affecting what grows where. Largely, we woodworkers are at the end of the chain and just have to adapt ...

 

[thetyreman]

I'd use sweet chestnut a lot it's just getting hold of some can be really difficult

 

[sneggysteve]

Try WentwoodTimberCentre

 

[HexusOdy]

I'd use sweet chestnut a lot it's just getting hold of some can be really difficult

Same. It should be the staple of British Woodwork. Yet one of the most difficult to source.

What's not to like about a fast growing, low sapwood hardwood timber that's good indoors and outdoors and has a great strength to weight ratio?

 

[HexusOdy]

Try WentwoodTimberCentre

Thanks. I'm east of England though. I prefer something closer to home. There is a place near Ipswich but they grow very little to board length and coppice most of it for fencing and firewood.

Wentwood's site spells out how good the timber is though.

"Sweet Chestnut is one of the most remarkable woods grown in Britain. The grain is similar in appearance to oak, perhaps a little less striking, but it is a much more stable timber. It splits easily, but as sweet chestnut dries it will tend to remain straight and develop very few cracks. It is just as durable as oak, has much less sapwood and is much easier to sustainably harvest as it grows quickly. It is not favoured by sawmills as logs can often have splits known as ring shake which renders some of the timber useless, but the fact is once any ring shake is cut out, it is for many purposes far superior to oak. Sweet chestnut is a little weaker and softer than oak, so not ideal for structural beams, but is perfect for furniture, cladding, decking and increasingly window making (where it is superior to anything else grown outside the tropics) and boatbuilding. "

 

[BucksDad]

A little bit closer for you to get some would be Whitmores Timber in Lutterworth

See this thread from Peter Sefton

https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/threads/preparing-timber.135082/#post-1546163

 

[mikej460]

I've bought a lot of cleft sweet chestnut for the garden over the years and I'm planning to buy a load of post and rail sections soon.. Once when I was talking to the owner of Say It With Wood in Herefordshire about chestnut cladding he said that it does have a tendency to split badly resulting in a lot of waste hence it's lack of appeal with sawmills. I wonder if it's something to do with speed of growth? Most rustic chestnut in the UK comes from pollarded trees which by their very nature grow fast and straight.

 

[Yojevol]

@MikeK How do you remove a post put up in error?

 

[Jacob]

I've bought a lot of cleft sweet chestnut for the garden over the years and I'm planning to buy a load of post and rail sections soon.. Once when I was talking to the owner of Say It With Wood in Herefordshire about chestnut cladding he said that it does have a tendency to split badly resulting in a lot of waste hence it's lack of appeal with sawmills. I wonder if it's something to do with speed of growth? Most rustic chestnut in the UK comes from pollarded trees which by their very nature grow fast and straight.

It isn't grown big enough to be all that useful in the UK. It is in France.
Horse chestnut used to be used a lot - big wide boards, easy to work, light weight, but uninteresting to look at, etc.
It's down to tradition and fashion but trees take 50 years or more to catch up. If you start asking for sweet chestnut now your grandchildren might get the benefit!

 

[pgrbff]

Sweet chestnut is the main timber where I live. Beams for floors and roof timbers, heads over doors, doors, infact everything. The ends of boards are often split resulting in significant waste. It isn't as nice to look at as oak and when used outside will stain everything brown when it rains. The better quality boards come from France.

 

[dannyr]

One major use in the UK was/is for palings joined by twisted wire - these can take being knocked into the ground and seem to even outlast oak in this situation where so many woods rot fast (stuck outside in British weather, untreated, half in the soil) - just been removing some 30+ year old palings from the middle of a hedge - the galvanised wire has mostly rusted away, but the palings are destined for further use. They are cleft, not sawn, and far from straight, but look great to my eye.