Replies

1. 
   Jammersix | Mar 27, 2009 11:33am | #1

   Because, in my opinion, the terms "hardwood" and "softwood" only relate to the protection of a specie's seeds, and have nothing to do with the "hardness" of the wood. They are merely two scientific classifications.

   Douglas Fir is harder than some "hardwoods", and has other properties that are more important to finishes than hardness. It is not, for instance, one of the "fuzzy" woods or one of the "stringy" woods.

   That's as good as I can describe it, but a better way to demonstrate what I'm trying to say is to point out that broadleaf maple isn't used for gunstocks-- it's "fuzzy", and doesn't take checkering well. Checkering in broadleaf maple comes out okay, but it's not as sharp or crisp as checkering in walnut or cocobolo.

   Relevant characteristics for a given task are relative, and rarely fall along scientific classifications, in my experience. I believe that the scientist classified woods for different purposes than any mere woodworker.

   (Note that in this post, "fuzzy" and "stringy" are my words, and are defined the way my daughter would define them. I'm sure there are better, more accurate, perhaps even real words that do the job better.)

   Clear fir, vertical grain fir, (don't get me started about the difference between "vertical grain" and "quartersawn") is used for interior trim for exactly that reason-- it can be made quite smooth easily.

   And now you are two cents richer. You have my two cent's worth, and all you have to do is fence it.

   
   

   ---

   Edited 3/27/2009 4:41 am by Jammersix

1. 
   WillGeorge | Mar 27, 2009 03:58pm | #2

   Relevant characteristics for a given task are relative.. You bet!

   Card scrapers are a tool I use second to my routers and I guess my TS ranks third.

   I have some planes but I never learned to use them and do something other than 'easing' a corner or tasks that leaves a nice 'edge'.

   Very off topic: BUT...

   Yes, I'm a power tool user. However, I do use my many hand tools when I feel they will do the job 'for my skills' when using them. I am more than pretty good with any hand saw. For some reason, I can cut a straight line without even trying. Maybe because I was born with something in my brain that just hates crooked things?

   ......

   A hand scraper can do amazing things! IF you have strong fingers resistant to heat. Sort of like that old cook reaching into the hot oil to get that last shrimp that turned pink and could not find the tool to scoop it out of the oil...

   (Note that in this post, "fuzzy" and "stringy") Perfect descriptions in my opinion.

   and are defined the way my daughter would define them.

   I have three beautiful Daughters (Mothers looks.. Not mine.. And more than several female grandbabies) Most of the time they described things as Yuckie?... Or yelled out.. DAD.. A spider in our bedroom!....  HELP! I would let the spider walk onto my hand and take it outside.. They never caught on to 'lesson'. I came back alive after leaving it go without squashing it...

   ....

   Long ago I made a 18/20 foot, there about in size, cabin cruiser?, from straight grained Douglas Fir. Late 1960? I forget... Just a kid out of the Army and had no idea about what a card scraper was... For Wood that is... But I had used 'scrapers' on Babbet bearings on some very old 'super hot steam' generators in a power plant. Maybe I was in reform school then? YES, I was JUST the helper and just did all the grunt rough cuts. The old timer MADE sure I did not cut too deep and came in 'corrected' my hard work! Correcting my work took a day or two... Great fun with that very OLD, very STRICT, and I would say a loving and funny man! I wonder if God has Babbet Bearings for him to work on in Heaven?

   ...

   As to the card scraper working on 'Soft Wood'.. There are them HARDER grain that you have to work down to be able to get to the SOFTER grain! Sort of like working wit' BONDO on a chopped 41 Ford Truck!

   ALL in all.. Your post said it all, OK most... :>)

1. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 27, 2009 08:26pm | #4

   Will,Routers, scrapers, then tablesaw... interesting order, each woodworker will have their own order of course. But you are right about scrapers - if you know how to sharpen and use them, the will be one of the most used tools in the shop. When I use card scrapers, I put on a pair of gloves. They not only insulate the heat (I can scrape aggressively until my thumbs get sore and not feel the heat), but also keep my fingers from turning black and the occasional cut from a sharp edge. Someone recommended carver's finger tip guards, made of leather.The other benefit of using scrapers (and planes) instead of sandpaper on softwoods like Douglas fir is that you will end up with a flatter surface. Sandpaper will tend to remove more of the softer wood between the grain (early wood or late wood?). I think that this is what you were trying to say in your last paragraph. If you don't believe this, try sanding a piece of douglas fir or other softwood with very distinct grain lines and draw pencil lines perpendicular to the grain. Then use a scraper to try to remove the pencil. You will quickly remove the pencil from the dark streaks of grain, but will have to work more to get the pencil from the light streaks of grain.I envy your hand saw abilities. My saws (all of them, so it's not the set) seems to drift to the left. I try to compensate and do okay, but sometimes I overcompensate.Chris @ http://www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com(soon to be http://www.flairwoodworks.com)

    - Success is not the key to happiness.  Happiness is the key to success.  If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer

1. 
   davcefai | Mar 27, 2009 08:40pm | #5

   "My saws (all of them, so it's not the set) seems to drift to the left"FWIIW I am just starting to manage to use a handsaw. I seem to be able to correct that very problem by standing a little more to the left than I "naturally" would.Now if I could correct the tendency of my planes to produce a bevel away from me...... Actually it's not the planes, it's me :-)

1. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 27, 2009 08:47pm | #6

   Stand to the left... I'll try that. Off to the shop right now!Chris @ http://www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com(soon to be http://www.flairwoodworks.com)

    - Success is not the key to happiness.  Happiness is the key to success.  If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer

2. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 27, 2009 08:14pm | #3

   I use the terms hard and soft wood to differentiate between deciduous and coniferous trees. It's easier to say, though not at all accurate (just compare Pacific Yew ("softwood") and basswood ("hardwood").Douglas fir is softer than most hardwoods, but certainly not the softest of woods. So it seems that the relative hardness of wood has nothing to do with scrapability, more the texture of the wood, as you mentioned. So what properties of wood are necessary to scrape it effectively? Better question: are there any woods that you cannot scrape? And how do we determine that it doesn't scrape - is the resulting surface rough or is no shaving produced?PS: All: I have two cents given to my by Jammersix. I will relinquish them for two bits.Chris @ http://www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com(soon to be http://www.flairwoodworks.com)

    - Success is not the key to happiness.  Happiness is the key to success.  If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer

1. 
   Jammersix | Mar 27, 2009 10:56pm | #7

   Man, that's what I call a markup!No wonder I'm not rich. I never used more than keystone markup. I'm switching immediately-- take the COGS, multiply by twelve, and put that sucker up for sale!That's exactly the way I used to do it, Chris. I thought that the line between deciduous and evergreen was the dividing line for more than twenty five years. Then I got involved with the internet, and that led to books, washing dishes EVERY time you use them, UPS, roses for my wife and chrome furniture, and it's been all downhill since then. Change is bad, and I'm sure that ruin lies just around the corner. The only thing I remain certain of is that it's going to be expensive.The first person I heard claim that the dividing line was between seeds that had certain types of coverings (hard cover, hardwoods, soft or no covering, softwoods) was Christopher Schwarz, in his book "Workbenches".The quote is: "The difference between a so-called hardwood or softwood has nothing to do at all with the wood's woodworking properties. Instead, it has to do with how the trees reproduce. Yes, tree sex. Look it up if you don't believe me. Hardwoods are angiosperms, which means their seeds have a covering, such as an acorn. Softwoods are gymnosperms, which means their seeds don't."The citation is:Christopher Schwarz, Workbenches (Cincinnati: Popular Woodworking Books, 2007), 16.I was skeptical, of course. After all, the guy's a writer and a publisher, what could he know about wood compared to a hard core, four season front line Carpenter like me?Well, for starters, he knows the difference between a softwood and a hardwood...So I took his suggestion, and read "Understanding Wood", by R. Bruce Hoadley. (Taunton Press, 1981.)That screwed everything up. MY understanding of wood was now completely higglety-pigglety. I'll never again refer to wood as a "living, breathing material." All the wood in my shop is deader than a doornail. That's part of (and the direct cause of) many of the problems it can cause me.Then I remembered that maple, in spite of being a "hardwood" of wide renown here in the U.S., is not used for gunstocks or pistol grips because it's too "fuzzy". Then I remembered that clear fir is used for trim, in spite of being a "softwood".So now I'm looking for descriptions of woods that describe a given specie's woodworking properties, and am piecing together my views of different species from the ground (so to speak) up.Out there on the internet, amidst the towering piles of steaming, sweating opinion, there are small snippets of useful information regarding the woodworking properties of different species. I search for them at night, (it's an undertaking that seems to lend itself to the dead of darkness) and when I get sick of opinion, I go back to reading Horatio Hornblower.The most useful pieces I've found (read: the snippets I've found that most closely align with my own cherished beliefs) have been about wood used for specific purposes: workbenches, gunstocks, pistol grips, tables, rockers, cabinets.When people start talking in generalities about wood, the steam coming off the pile seems to fog my glasses.So.Your data point, complete with an excellent picture, is one more piece of information: Douglas Fir can be scraped to a nice finish.It is my firm opinion that you should ask SIX bits for this post.

1. 
   davcefai | Mar 28, 2009 01:17am | #8

   To make it a little easier:Botanical Hardwoods are Angiosperms and have broad leaves.
   Softwoods are Gymnosperms and have narrow leaves or needles.And looking at the leaves is a heck of a lot easier than hunting for the seeds.My Botany lecturers used to then say: "Of course we then have soft hardwoods and hard softwoods and hard hardwoods....." before starting off on resins and resistance to fungi and insects.And good grief! That was more than 37 years ago.

2. 
   flairwoodworks | Mar 28, 2009 04:27am | #9

   Six months ago, I would have asked a lot less, but ever since I started my business and learned about overhead and such...Woods/trees can indeed be divided into deciduous and coniferous, but it is of little use to us woodworkers. I remember Chris' little rant on this topic which you quoted. Titillating! Usually, I only work with hard woods (possibly because I hate sanding) but now I will reconsider. What properties do you think make wood scrape-able? Probably not density. Hardness? Grain structure? More investigation is required.Kudos to you for reading Understanding Wood. Did you read it through? I've started reading Identifying Wood, but it is so dry, I've only made 20 pages in or so.As per your suggestion, I am now asking six bits. If those bits happen to be Robertsons, only two bits.Chris @ http://www.flairwoodwork.spaces.live.com(soon to be http://www.flairwoodworks.com)

    - Success is not the key to happiness.  Happiness is the key to success.  If you love what you are doing, you will be successful. - Albert Schweitzer

1. 
   Jammersix | Mar 28, 2009 11:48pm | #10

   I've been thinking on that, and reading about it as much as time allows.At first, I thought that the "grain" (a term that's thrown around rather loosely) would determine a wood's characteristics, but mahogany, an open grained wood, defeats that theory. Mahogany works very nicely, although it's too "stringy" for checkering.So now my answer is "I don't know"-- certainly things like breaking strengths, relative hardness, bending point and all the engineering stuff has been measured and recorded, but I'm not having much luck finding information on the subjective stuff.I mean, how do you measure how "stringy" a species is? Or how "scrapable"?I'm pretty sure I don't have the patience to figure out which woods scrape the best, then look at each of them through a microscope, looking for similarities... (Or for differences between those woods and woods that don't scrape well.)P.S. Oh, about Understanding Wood-- thank you, but I'm not sure the kudos are deserved. Yes, I read it, but there's a bunch of stuff in there about relative humidity, water content and moisture gradient that made my hair hurt. So I had to read it twice. Then I had to eat hot dogs. Then one day, as I was studying my dust collector, it all sort of fell into place, the same way sixteen inch centers did one day Back In The Day, and I understood.So now I get it-- I understand relative humidity and moisture content, but I gotta tell you-- it was a painful process. I'm really glad I don't have to go through it again.It was a lot easier to get the two trains.You know, the one that leaves Chicago eastbound at 11:45 P.M., traveling at 80 mph, on Feb 29 in a leap year, and the one that leaves New York, traveling westbound at 76 mph at one minute after midnight on March 1, and they both meet at some point in the middle, which causes the relative humidity to drop suddenly and they both dry out so fast they burst into flame.Or something.

   Edited 3/28/2009 4:57 pm by Jammersix

2. 
   davcefai | Mar 30, 2009 09:59am | #11

   One can short circuit all the science and simply apply a scraper to a piece of wood. It then boils down to shavings or not, smooth surface or not.

   I have just started using scrapers and have been scraping ...... SOFTWOOD!

   To be fair, an old stool, literally "weathered" from sleeping outside too often and with loose joints. I used scrapers to remove the grey flakey stuff. The end result was not a good surface but it did not need much sanding to remedy this. On the plus side, trying to sand off the top layer would have generated a LOT of dust.

   I think that, like most other aspects of any work, hard and fast rules don't work. Nothing beats just having a go.