I bought some hard maple from the sawmill and paid nearly $2.00 a bd.ft. for it but it was flawless all white 8/4 x 8″x 8 feet. which I’d intended to make into stair nosings.
A year or so later I needed to buy some more subflooring and the sawmill sold me some 8/4 x8″ x8 feet soft maple for only 20 cents a bd.ft.
well I had some left over and stacked it with the hard maple figuring it would be easy to tell apart. Worst case I’d shove my thumbnail into it and that would tell me..
It’s now years later and I’ve moved my wood around countless times. I can’t tell which is which.. So I figured I’d run it thru the planer and whichever was flawless (I’d picked them out myself right off of the line) would be the hard maple..
Every single plank is flawless All white! My thumbnail won’t tell me. and I can’t see any differance.
So how do I tell?
The hard maple is going on the stairs, the soft maple was going to be used for door jams etc.. So obviously I want the hardest for the floor.
Replies
It's tough. With the naked eye it's difficult to tell if your supplier is giving you one or the other. They usually have different patterns of ray seriation, with a higher count in hard maple. You'd need some kind of magnifying lens to check it. Some soft maple has a hint of grey in it. You could send samples for analysis, but with a large lot of mixed stock that's not too practical. Hoadley's "Understanding Wood" has illustrations of what you should look for .
Jim
If you can't tell, does it matter?
Try putting a nail into the wood, the hard maple will be much more difficult. I agree, I have moved my maple around several times and the soft & hard got mixed. My hard maple had a more pronounced grain pattern with very fine lines whereas the soft had wider lines. Guess it had to do with growth rate. Hard maple grows much slower so the growth rings are tighter.
Hi frenchy,
Maybe your supplier sold you hard maple both times, inadvertently or not. The soft maple I see around here seems a little "fuzzy" and lighter when handled compared to hard. Sometimes, though, you just can't tell. ( How's that for a scientific analysis? )
Paul
This is an interesting problem. When I built my WW workbench, I used 'soft' maple because that's what grows around here on the west coast. I was thinking I had an inferior 'soft' wood in my bench. But it appears that the difference in hardness is minimal at best, from what others are saying. That makes me feel better about my bench, although I love the bench anyway.We have hardness testers for metal, most common being the Rockwell hardness tester. The device used a hardened tip to penetrate the metal and the force needed to penetrate the metal gives an indication of it's hardness. Critical information for engineering. Wouldn't there be a similar machine/process for wood? I've never heard of one, but it almost would surprise me that there would not be one....Jeff
Yes, soft maple is softer than hard maple, but it's still reasonably hard (about the same as cherry and walnut, and quite a bit harder than poplar).
The hardness test for wood is the Janka test, and works pretty much like the Rockwell test: A hardened steel sphere is pressed into the sample until half of the sphere is buried. The pressure required to reach this point is recorded.
Some values (from Chris Schwarz's excellent new book, Workbenches):
White pine
380 psi
Poplar
540 psi
Soft maple
950 psi
White oak
1360 psi
Hard maple
1450 psi
Ipé
3680 psi
-Steve
Steve,
Your last is my best approach. I have a hydraulic press and I can measure the pressure that is applied.. I have some white oak to base line the test. and with similar pressure I should have nearly the same dent depth in hard maple as in oak.. the soft maple should be significantly more shallow.. .
I can't wait!
Thank you!
wait a minute.. does that number account for the growth location? I mean wood grown on southern slopes would be softer than wood grown on northern slopes wouldn't it?
So hard maple grown on southern slopes might test out at the same number as soft maple grown on Northern slopes..
What the heck!!? If they both test out about the same they should wear about the same..
frenchy,
That depends on what time of day it was cut. You'll have to contact your sawyer!
:-)
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
The hardness numbers are averages. But since the baseline difference between hard and soft maple is pretty significant, you should still be able to distinguish the two based on hardness, with maybe a few "outlier" samples that test smack dab in the middle.
-Steve
Q: How do you tell hard maple from soft maple?
A: With great difficulty.
The definitive test is microscopic examination: If you look at some cleanly-pared end grain with a 10X hand lens, the rays (the lines running perpendicular to the annual growth rings) are different: In hard maple, the rays come in two general size groups, big ones and small ones (the small ones are so small that they can be hard to see, even with a magnifier). Within each group, there is size variation, but there is a reasonably clear distinction between the two groups. In soft maple, the rays are all roughly the same size (about the size of the larger ones in hard maple).
I wish I had some way of taking high-magnification photos, because I happen to have samples of hard and soft maple that clearly show the difference.
Aside from microscopic examination, hardness is probably your best bet--on average, hard maple is 50% harder than soft maple--so the "nail test" will probably work reasonably well.
Hard maple is also about 20% denser than soft maple, so you can cut samples out and weight them, but this requires that you measure carefully in your cutting, that you dry the samples in the oven or microwave to drive out all moisture, and that you have an accurate balance to weigh them on. I don't know how much sample-to-sample variation there is in density; it could be so high that it swamps the species-to-species difference.
There is supposedly a chemical test that you can use: Applying an iron sulfate solution will turn hard maple greenish-gray, and soft maple bluish-black. I haven't tried this one, but if it does work, it's probably the easiest method. You can get iron sulfate at a well-stocked garden center.
Face- and edge-grain visual characteristics aren't very reliable; they're too similar overall, and there's too much board-to-board variation.
-Steve
Avoid all the questions and guessing. Put the tables and guides away. Don't mess up you manicure and save that nail. Just send it to me and I'll get back to you, someday.............yeah, that's it. I'll get back to you. ;)
...The unspoken word is capital. We can invest it or we can squander it. -Mark Twain...Be kind to your children....they will choose your nursing home....aim low boys, they're ridin' shetland ponies !!
Guys, guys, guys - you are missing the point!
The real question here is:
Frenchy, what in the hell are you doing paying $2.00 /bf for lumber? Have you lost your freakin mind? Quick, somebody call a doctor.
:) Lee
Lee,
I'm guilty of the worst kind of sin.. Wood envy!
For years I watched wood come off the mill and the highest priced wood they had was hard maple..
I could get Black walnut for peanuts.. (as low as 17 cents) and even cherry was relatively cheap.. Heck I could buy 1/4 sawn FAS white oak for 40 cents for a long time..
But I was determined to have an expensive floor.. so I bought hard maple.. and bloodwood plus brass for inlays.. And you can't have just one floor of maple so the tower is maple and the stairs are maple and well, I spent money like a drunken sailor.
Hello my name is frenchy and I'm a woodaholic.. ...................... ;-)
ROFL...Frenchy, I can get western maple cheap out here. I'll swap ya some maple for some black walnut, straight across. Whaddya say?
jeff,
What's western maple? Who pays the shipping?
Nah! I shouldn't do it! It's been nearly six months since I last bought any wood.. here you're trying to tempt me back into that life of addiction.. ;-)
You would consider it 'soft' maple. Bigleaf maple is the most common maple tree that is native out here, although there are a number of maple trees native to the area. All would be considered 'soft' maple though.I guess the high cost of shipping these days would kill this deal. If for some reason I need to come your way though, I'll let you know, I could hook up my flatbed trailer, it hauls about 1500 board feet or more, depending on how dry the wood is...My name is Jeff...and I too...am an addict......I'm currently building a new outbuilding to create more storage for wood, beyond the 4000 or so bf I have on hand now...I don't know which is worse...my wood addiction...or my tool addiction...like they say...it's ALL good...;-)
Jeff,
Hello my name is Frenchy and I too am a tool addict.. Never met a tool I didn't want to buy.
As for your mere 4000 bd.ft. I sure wish my problem was down to that scale..
My stack of wood is about ten feet deep, 50 feet long and about 10 feet high.. 40% black walnut, 40% hard maple and 20 percent cherry, white oak, etc..
...My stack of wood...Hmmm....sounds like a challenge...I'll get back to you when I get my new wood storage building done...;-)
What about using soft maple for a workbench? I picked up a load of maple consisting of mostly shorts (less that 6 ft) and some longer stock. My intent is to build a new bench and some cabinets with working surface tops. I plan is to use the sorter stock for the cabinet tops and the longer for the bench. While loading the gentleman helping me told me, the longer stuff looked like soft maple. He offered to return my money but I took the lumber anyway. This lumber is air-dried and weathered. I can’t see any deference. I ran some of the shorts through the jointer and planer and it cleans nicely. My concern is; will the soft maple be hard enough for a bench top? I can always finger join the shorter hard maple for the top using the soft maple for other parts. Reading this thread sound like the soft maple will work for the top just may be susceptible to dents. Any ideas on how well soft maple works for a bench top?
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Bob T.
BobT
I don't see where it will hurt a lot.. yes the top will mark up easier than Hard maple but you won't wear it out like you would if you were walking on it..
Soft maple is plenty hard- unless you are doing a bowling alley, I wouldn't worry. Hard maple- also called "rock" maple is generally (at least in New England) sugar maple (a bit of a misnomer as nearly all maples yield sap that can be sugared). Nearly all figured maples are soft.
Were I you, I would pick my boards by appearance- if they look alike they should do fine. You can anticipate the look by wiping on some finish (I am given to understand that shellac is pretty good, but if not you can use mineral spirits) and comparing. Softer wood than yours has made many a durable tread...
Glaucon
If you don't think too good, then don't think too much...
Glaucon,
True enough I suppose but I bought hard maple and I have soft maple for other locations where wear won't ever be a factor.. I'm just annal enough to worry about the differance!
Heck, I used stainless steel lag bolts building this place because in a few hundred years the regular steel lag bolts might be affected by corrosion caused by use in Black Walnut timbers or white oak timbers. The fact that the purpose of those lag bolts is back up for the timberframing didn't prevent me from worrying. ;-)
At 20 cents a board foot I would not have any room in my shop for all the wood I would have in there. Best I have found near my new house is $1 for common hard maple.
benhasajeep,
Carefull there buddy! Wood addiction is a serious medical condition.. In extreme cases it can result in you sleeping in the dog house or worse..
I started out with over 50,000 bd.ft. of hardwood. The total I paid for all of that was under $25,000 or about a 25 cents per board foot (that includes the expensive wood)
My sawmill was sneaky.. just when I thought I had my addiction under control they'd offer me a insane deal on some fiddleback maple for 10 cents a bd.ft. and more wood came home.. Or a whole load of thins for $20.00
It got so bad that I was selling to family and friends.. 5/4 ash for 15 cents, curly cherry for 20 cents.. Eventually my sister stood up to me and refused to accept anymore nearly free wood.. Guys at work wouldn't look me in the eye for fear that I would spend the next 20 minutes of their life trying to give away more wood..
Only the effective intervention of the city forced me to limit my wood addiction.. Luckily I was able to cold turkey it. (stacking 10,000 bd.ft. indoors helped) Losing a indoor parking stall helped more. Everytime I'd climb into the frozen cab of my pickup and remembered how nice it was to climb into the warm cab when the truck was parked indoors it would be a painful cold reminder..
Long lost uncle Frenchy. Long time no see. :) :)
Did I mention I have a 3,000 sqft building you can store some of your lumber in?
...It got so bad that I was selling to family and friends.. 5/4 ash for 15 cents, curly cherry for 20 cents...
Frenchy, I'll be your friend any time...what's for sale, any cherry left??
...;-) Jeff
jeff,
I've managed to kick the habit but I'm sure that if you go to my sawmill when they are sawing cherry and ask for a load of thins they will gladly sell you enough cherry to cause your truck bumper to drag on the pavement on the way home for a $20.00
They'll also do it with oak or maple or whatever..
Now thins are any board less than an inch thick.. it might be 7/8ths or 3/4 or 1/2 heck it might be all the way down to a little over 3/8ths.. Mother nature never makes her trees exactly the right size so what's left over I'd get.. usually they are pretty great wood too because they'd square up the log and make the first cut to come out with a finished cant of whatever size they are looking for..That first cut is known as the thin..
I stack them in piles and when I have enough 3/4 to do whatever I want I'll run them thru the planer and put them up.. really thin ones like under 1/2 inch I use for firewood. 1/2 to 3/4 I use for panels, raised panels , wall panels, or ceiling panels.
I'll eventually use them for drawer sides / bottoms or something else..
The great deals on overstock or not picked up items they tend to give to guys like me who used to bring them donuts and milk on saturday mornings I'd be there picking up wood. On occasion I'd buy a case of beer for whoever was doing most of the sawing and in return he'd set aside the really spectacular boards like the birds eye red oak, Some Boxelder with the most wicked red lightening bolt coloration in it, or the really cool fiddleback white oak..
Sometimes they'd just toss them in my truck sometimes they'd charge me regular price and never once did I ever fell like I ever got less than a fantastic deal..
Wow. I get it. I wonder what kinda donuts my sawyer likes...I'm not sure he drinks beer, he's kind of a family man. I wonder if he likes home made apple cider?Thanks Frenchy, that helps me a LOT....feed my addiction, that is...;-)On another note...I got to talking to my sawyer some time back, and asked him what his price for various hardwood rough sawn boards would be if I bought them before they go to the kiln. The price he quoted was a revelation, and introduced me to a completely different pricing structure. I can dry my own wood, and THAT is the source of considerable savings, for me anyway. Since I have a lot of dried wood on hand to begin with, it's no big deal to wait for the other to dry.Jeff
jeff,
Absolutely! Drying is free! Just takes a little time. If you buy enough wood you will always have some drying, some ready, and some being made into stuff. Once you have the set up of stickers and straps you can afford to stock up on wood that is rough sawn and green.. I dried a lot of wood outdoors without anything covering them.. just coat the ends so they don't check badly! If you use paint apply it right away and again in two weeks if it's oil based paint. Every week if it's latex.. Learn to buy mismixed paint from hardware and paint stores. They will look at you strangely as you pick up 5 gallons of paint all differant colors and a couple of oil based as well!
Someone who buys a few boards at a time and takes years to finish the project won't ever be a real wood addict and he will always pay retail for wood. He'll hear the prices I quote and think I must be lying.
He'll never know how sweet it is to run a rather nondescrept grey board thru the planner and have this wonderful piece with all sorts of interesting charcter and figure come out the other end..
He'll buy his straight grained knot free wood and think he's really got something.. If he get's bold he'll glue some character on like kids put decals on their bicycles and wagons..
He'll never know the joy of finding the perfect piece from your stash and incorperating it in while cutting off all that boring straight grained stuff.
Jeff, Buy Mill run wood from a sawyer who also sells to pallet mills and makes railroad ties.. If you buy graded wood you are paying someone to sort out the great stuff and sell you the boring straight grain knot free stuff at a real premium..
Sure there are places where that boring straight grain stuff is nice,, but you'll get your share of that if you buy mill run. But you will also get a few pieces with real chracter. If you have enough wood maybe you can even figure out how to feature those pieces..
Once you visit the sawyer regularly with donuts etc.. he'll start to do you favors and such that's when the wood addiction really kicks into high gear.. ;-)
Ummmm, Mr. Frenchy,
I started out with over 50,000 bd.ft. of hardwood. The total I paid for all of that was under $25,000 or about a 25 cents per board foot (that includes the expensive wood)
Wow, you must have given him a BIG tip!
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
Bob,
To a certain degree I was doing him a favor.. Wood has a relatively short market life.. people don't want boards that have turned grey or black.. However that grey comes off the second you make a pass with your planer!
That's when you see the real beauty of the wood you just bought.
I can't descibe the joy I feel as I see a piece of wood with beautiful charcter and figure come from a non-descrept board. It's better than winning the lottery.. No wonder I'm an addict! I mean that really..
Just thinking about those hidden treasures get's me all itchy and wanting to visit the sawmill.. I wonder what beautiful pieces they have set aside for me..
Hello my name is frenchy and I'm a woodaholic..
Anyway as I was saying often if I didn't buy the wood it would go thru his shredder and become mulch.. So he got more from me than the market would pay him.. I was just lucky enough to deveop this relationship..
frenchy,
All I can say is it's a good thing I don't have the space to store it or I would probably be just as bad as you are collecting wood! I'm in this let's get stocked up mood most of the time.
Up here I know most of the loggers, truck drivers and all the sawyers (7 of them at last count). I'm also good friends with a lot of folks who work at the Ethan Allen furniture factory too so I get all kinds of interesting wood but mostly smaller pieces, i.e. less than 4'. Best part is that it's mostly FREE!
One of my friends at the factory gets me seconds or culls that would otherwise be thrown in the scrap pile or chipped! Pieces like cherry drawer fronts, drawer sides and bottoms, etc. Last night a logger stopped by the house with 6 nice birch burls. All he wants is nice unfinished box for his troubles.
It's truly a sad life being addicted to all this junk, right!?
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
Bob my friend,
Do I need to come there to do an intervention? ;-)
Nah, I think there are worse addictions to have..
frenchy,
You doing a wood addiction intervention for me! Hah!
That would be like you trying to convince me not to use shellac!
If you insist on coming though, bring a good sized stack on that flatbed trailer with ya. :-)
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
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