Quarter Sawn Oak

[orb]

Anyone have a good supplier of quarter sawn white oak? I'm looking to make a dinning room table and I can't seem to find any nicely figured oak locally.

/forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

 

[beenthere]

You have no bio, so what is "locally"?

I suggest you find people with small mills and ask them if they saw white oak, and if they would saw it into quarter-sawn. Some don't because they don't have a market for it. It isn't done unless they have an order to fill because the way some saw it, there is less recovery from the log. Thus it usually is more expensive.

Very pretty wood though. White oak is prettier when quarter-sawn than red oak, because the rays are shorter in the white oak. The rays are the "flecks" that you see in quarter-sawn oak.

 

[RET]

I need a refresher lesson. How is quarter-sawn sawn?

Instead of cutting boards from the logs parallel to the log center line, you actualy saw at some angle - the saw enters the log on one side, crosses the center line, then exits on the other side of the log some distance down? Is that somewhat close to the right decription?

Can't learn if you don't ask dumb questions can ya?
thx
ret

 

[sugarmaker]

I started typing, but found a better answer here via the Universal Mind.

 

[Anonymous Poster]

Condon Lumber, White Plains, NY (914) 946-4111.

You will pay for it, though.

Condon Lumber is a well known supplier of high quality lumber for those willing to pay the freight (in more ways than one). /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

The last time I checked, a brochure and price list was available for the asking.

SnowRidge

 

[orb]

I have bought from this guy before:

wood

nice stuff but his prices are outrageous, $25/bdft! I have a couple of local saw mills but none of them kiln dry and I don't think my wife will wait two years for the green stuff to air dry.

I'm hoping to find two bookmatched wide boards or at least 2 pair of bookmatched 8" boards with a nice flame pattern.

 

[RET]

Sugarmaker,
Cool!
Thanks for the lesson.
RET

 

[webbmeister]

Orb:

I didn't see (doesn't mean it isn't there!) an answer to the question: "Where do you live?" QSWO is, indeed, a magnificent wood. I think that as the Craftsman/Prairie/Mission styles continue to become amazingly popular, more and more sawyers are quarter sawing more and more white oak. Here in Illinois, most of the commercial lumber yards have QSWO at $7-$9 bf, depending on width, length, and thickness of the stock. My supplier, Kirkland Sawmill, sells QSWO 4/4 at less than $4 per bf if you buy 100bf+. Their stock is nicely dried, mostly. I have run across a batch or two that have shown some case-hardening. The upsides are the price and the absolutely spectacular grain/ray/fleck combinations. Really, so beautiful that it drives home the notion that there is spirit in wood.

Jim

 

[Hank]

Sugarmaker's site shows the sawing process graphically pretty well.

Basically, the stability and character of a quarter sawn board comes from the fact that the growth rings run perpendicular to the board's face, rather than [roughly] parallel to it, as in plain sawn lumber.

This not only exposes different characteristics of the grain (the rays, in the case of oak), but also makes the board more resistant to warpage.

In all lumber, the board will tend to "follow" the growth rings, and thereby cup somewhat in that direction.

When plain sawn, the cup appears on the board's faces. When quarter sawn, the cup appears at the board's edge, and is much easier to eliminate, and is more stable over time.

 

[MikeNC]

If you're willing to make a road trip, try Wall lumber in south central VA:

http://www.walllumber.com/default.asp

He's listing $4.50 bd ft for quarter sawn white oak. Add 10 cents for under 100 bd ft, and 10 cents to have it planed. He lets you pick through the pile (within reason). If you call ahead they'll let you know what kind of selection they have available.

Mike