Wood that deserves better

[Sawdust=manglitter]

Had a meal with the other half in a Marsdons chain pub earlier. The table next to ours, all sticky and dirty, happened to be made using some incredibly figured fiddleback wood (not certain of species). I didn’t get a photo clearly showing the end grain (the OH was embarrassed with me taking the first one), but the boards were around 40mm thick solid boards!! Personally i think the wood deserved a lot better.

 

[Trevanion]

I'm about 99.9% certain that's rippled Ash. You get quite a lot of it up here in the hills just for that reason, it's growing on the side of hills. It requires more strength to grow upright when it's on an incline, hence why you get these very hard rippled trees which are beautiful. I've got some rippled olive ash offcuts from a staircase I made in work, the timber came off the customer's property. There's still a barn full left on the property.

I suppose the table will be used many thousands of times in its life, with the occasional person such as yourself appreciating it.

 

[Sgian Dubh]

You get quite a lot of it up here in the hills just for that reason, it's growing on the side of hills. It requires more strength to grow upright when it's on an incline, hence why you get these very hard rippled trees which are beautiful.

That's interesting. Are you able to cite a scientific study source or sources for that particular growth pattern developing in hill grown ash trees, and perhaps other species, e.g., maples, oaks, etc.? If you can it would add a useful titbit to what I already know about timber technology for future reference. Slainte.

 

[topchippyles]

That is oak by the looks and the effect depends on the pub look.

 

[Sawdust=manglitter]

I'm about 99.9% certain that's rippled Ash. You get quite a lot of it up here in the hills just for that reason, it's growing on the side of hills. It requires more strength to grow upright when it's on an incline, hence why you get these very hard rippled trees which are beautiful.

I have heard it somehwere before that’s one of the reasons for the rippling grain effect. And thinking about it i think you’re right about it being Ash, its the stain that threw me off (and the general stickyness of the surface)

That is oak by the looks and the effect depends on the pub look.

I think its Ash as Trevanion suggests. There were a number of tables that were similar, but this specific one happened to have those very figured boards.

 

[Beau]

Yep looks like ash with some old yellowing varnish.

Interesting about the theory on the ripple. Not met it on our trees but we dont have many ash on our steepest hedges. What sort of angle would expect to start seeing it?

 

[custard]

I agree that it's most likely Rippled Ash. It's not quite as common as Rippled Sycamore, but neither is it particularly rare.

This is typical of the Rippled Ash boards that I've bought over the years,

And here are some Olive Ash boards that also have pronounced rippled figure,

The rippled figure is only really found on the quarter sawn faces, so you're counting on the saw mill identifying the rippled figure early on during conversion and then amending their sawing plan to maximise quarter sawn boards. With Ash that's not a particularly likely scenario, consequently I suspect there's plenty of gloriously figured Ash that's never seen the light of day as it was processed as plain sawn boards.

Regarding timber grown on hill sides, or "hanger" timber as it's known around here. By and large it's not suitable for furniture use as there's too much reaction wood, which means it's unlikely to be sufficiently stable.

I've heard plenty of theories about why one tree shows ripple figure and the tree next to it doesn't, I'm not sure there's a compelling consensus behind any one theory, but I've never heard that growing on an incline promotes ripple.

 

[Trevanion]

I'll plant an ash tree on a hill and one on flat land, and we'll compare results in 50 years.

I've not really found a conclusive answer to why trees ripple, Just going off personal experience more than anything. Plus the experience of a very old school woodworker that told me that tidbit. Although I'm not 100% sure it's the correct answer, I've tended to believe it.

 

[Sgian Dubh]

I'll plant an ash tree on a hill and one on flat land, and we'll compare results in 50 years.
I've not really found a conclusive answer to why trees ripple.

Ah, thanks for responding. Fifty years is a bit too long for me to wait, I'm afraid, ha, ha.

I recall doing a fair amount of research in the process of writing my book Cut & Dried to see if any wood scientists had found identifiable causes for ripple figure, and other figuring for that matter, e.g., 'plum pudding', 'pomelle', 'tiger', etc. My research resulted in concluding there were/are generally no specific causes known to scientists. In other words, an individual tree of any species simply grows that way, whilst trees of even the same species nearby or surrounding the ripple figured one might also produce ripple, or might not. It seems to generally be a random characteristic that develops in some trees, but not others. Thanks again. Slainte.

 

[Sawdust=manglitter]

I wonder if anyone’s ever tried ‘cloning’ a known rippled tree from cuttings to see if it happens again to see if its a ‘genetic’ thing or whether it’s an environmental cause?

 

[Suffolkboy]

by the time you know it has rippled timber the time for taking cuttings has long past I would have thought.

 

[MusicMan]

You can take a scion off a twig and graft it into rootstock, at any stage in a tree's life. I've done this with an old apple tree that I wanted to preserve. The character of the tree goes with the scion; the rootstock just determines the growth habit.

Keith

 

[Suffolkboy]

But by the time you determine that the tree has got the rippled effect to the timber it's been felled, transported and milled. I imagine by then it's going to be too late to take any viable cutting as it's dead? Or maybe not?

 

[MusicMan]

You can keep the end shoots of branches for a few weeks if they are chilled and damp.

 

[Suffolkboy]

but unless you did that to every tree you felled on the off chance it had rippled timber you wouldn't have the cutting a few weeks later when the timber was sawn. Then it would take what? 35-50 years for your sapling to reach maturity and be felled and milled before you know if it worked or not.

 

[Sgian Dubh]

If you know what you're looking for you can usually tell if you have some forms of interesting figuring before you even cut down the tree. I'm no expert but I've been shown by those that look for such characteristics (a sawyer and a timber yard owner) how, by peeling off a section of bark, it reveals the growth patterns underneath. I recall exactly this when a timber yard owner peeled back the bark of a sycamore sawlog to show me what he meant, and he exclaimed with some excitement about having found wavy grain that would need to be sawn just right to maximise the figuring in sawn boards, which would also lead to charging a bit more per cube.

Anyway, that conversation, and a couple more with others in the felling, conversion and seasoning game illustrated the ability that those in such professions have to read a tree's trunk. So, maybe, it's more than possible you can take a scion from a live tree and graft it as MusicMan suggested. I suppose the question then is how likely is the new growth to replicate the characteristics of the original tree? I'm guessing that's something for the botanists and geneticists to discuss - are identical twins exactly the same in every way even though their genetic code is the same? Slainte.

 

[Sawdust=manglitter]

If you know what you're looking for you can usually tell if you have some forms of interesting figuring before you even cut down the tree. I'm no expert but I've been shown by those that look for such characteristics (a sawyer and a timber yard owner) how, by peeling off a section of bark, it reveals the growth patterns underneath. I recall exactly this when a timber yard owner peeled back the bark of a sycamore sawlog to show me what he meant, and he exclaimed with some excitement about having found wavy grain that would need to be sawn just right to maximise the figuring in sawn boards, which would also lead to charging a bit more per cube.

Anyway, that conversation, and a couple more with others in the felling, conversion and seasoning game illustrated the ability that those in such professions have to read a tree's trunk. So, maybe, it's more than possible you can take a scion from a live tree and graft it as MusicMan suggested. I suppose the question then is how likely is the new growth to replicate the characteristics of the original tree? I'm guessing that's something for the botanists and geneticists to discuss - are identical twins exactly the same in every way even though their genetic code is the same? Slainte.

What would stop anyone in the know experimenting by taking a cutting from a known figured tree (based on experience and the evidence you mention) and planting a couple of cuttings in the same soil and conditions near the original tree and also planting a couple of cuttings elsewhere in differing conditions? This would be a start in proving whether its conditions or genetics, or even a combination of both? (unless someone somewhere has already done this). Proving this could possibly make someone's descendants wealthy people if successful... imagine whole forests of figured trees!? And imagine the beautiful furniture

 

[Sgian Dubh]

What would stop anyone in the know experimenting … proving whether its conditions or genetics, or even a combination of both?

Nothing, I suppose. But it won't be me conducting the experiment, ha, ha. Slainte.

 

[MusicMan]

I didn't say it was a short term project. Some people are soooooo impatient!

 

[custard]

I've heard foresters say that they'll sometimes grow a percentage of the Oak in a plantation to maximise pippy figure, but then lament that fashions change and some years pippy Oak sells at a discount rather than a premium.

In truth the market for highly figured timber in the UK is pretty small. I'm pretty sure that there now isn't a single veneer mill left remaining in the UK, and the European market for luthier timber is dominated by Spanish and German dealers. Consequently if a yard finds some well figured boards they'll either sell them on to a specialist like Timberline in Kent, or they'll try and drum up some interest from their existing customers. But over the years I've picked up plenty of extraordinarily well figured boards that have been gathering dust in a yard because no one was willing to pay a penny piece over standard prices.

There's even been cases where figured timbers have been rejected as being untypical. A few years ago I picked up some rippled Sycamore that a flooring manufacturer has passed through their heat treatment process (which is sometimes used to stabilise hardwood flooring), because it wouldn't match the photos in their catalogue! They jobbed the lot out to Tylers who then sold it on to assorted small furniture makers as a bit of a novelty timber.