I don’t know if this is under the right forum but here i go.
i want to get some Walnut for a project and while looking through my Rockler Magazine i noticed that they sell both Walnut and Black Walnut and i was wondering if anyone knew of any significant differences between them.
and while i’m on the subject does anyone have any advice on staining Walnut?
Replies
I've always known Northeastern U.S. walnut to be black walnut. I believe "California walnut" is the same or very close. Do a Google search and you'll find more than you need to know.
While you're there look into butternut as well. It's related.
I still have about 100 board feet from a tree my father and I cut down here in central New York State fifty years ago, but I am rapidly using it up now in cabinets, lamps and tables.
Pete
Colt-
First of all, search online for walnut ( Westpenn.com, Internetlumber.com etc.) and you will save a tremendous ammount of cash vs. Rockler, and discover many different types of wood. Black walnut is the most common walnut in North America, however claro walnut is more common on the western seaboard. I don't stain the pieces I make out of walnut, but then again, I don't use anything with sapwood.
Regards, Sean
i usually would prefer a dealer like that or a lumber yard. but my lumber yard would need to order me walnut and both the online and lumber yard had ordering requirements of about 20 board feet. thats almost 80-90 dollars. all i want to make though is a small trophy case out of 1/2" x 6" stock. so i would have 80 linear feet arriving at my door with no way to store it. Rockler has a much better policy with it only being a minimum of 5$ (with mixed species) and a 6" length of all the widths they sell.
Colt..... I usually try to get air dryed walnut. The kiln dryed usually has sapwod which they steam to get darkened like the heartwood which put a grayish tint to it, IMHO. Guess it depends on your project?
Soeone mentioned butternut, sometimes called white walnut. Almost the same textue as black walnut, maybe a wee coarser. And lighter: 28 lb/cu. ft vs. 40 lb/cu ft for the black.
Colt......... As for staining walnut, don't!! Oil, shellac brings out the best in walnut.
James
Here on the west coast in the Grand State of Confusion, there are two types of walnut plus subtypes. Black walnut here is a few different root stocks used for growing English walnut (the walnuts you eat) or the natural juglans californica (or something of the sort). The root stocks include both eastern black walnut cultivars and a new rootstock called "paradox" that has truly beautiful wood.
All the rootstocks have dark brown heartwood and creamy sapwood. If air dried, they all have subtle tints of red, green, and or purple mixed in the dark brown and can be spectacular. The English walnut is lighter but is often streaked with darker brown to black streaks and can also be spectacular.
The most valuable is the "graft-union" where the English top is grafted onto the root stock. Here, dark rootstock meets lighter fruiting wood with a complex dark interface. Some gunstock blanks with the graft union are exported to the fine shotgun industry in Europe for $5,00 to $10,000 per blank!
And there is no wood called "claro walnut". John Arno said that claro was just a term used to describe all the black walnuts growing and introduced to California. Because John said it, we can assume it's correct.
"And there is no wood called 'claro walnut'. John Arno said that claro was just a term used to describe all the black walnuts growing and introduced to California. Because John said it, we can assume it's correct."
Few of the names used in the timber industry are in any sense "official." They come into use by general consensus. So "claro walnut" means whatever the timber traders decide that it means. That's not very helpful to us woodworkers, but that's the way it goes.
-Steve
coltfanru
Rocklers etc. are easy places to buy wood but wow!!!!!!! do you pay a premium for that ease!
Second avoid staining walnut.. I mean you wouldn't colorize the MOna Lisa would you? Stain on walnut makes the wood look less brillant and vibrant.. the vibrance comes from wood that isn't kiln dried. All the colors that real walnut have are there. the purples the reds blacks white and browns.. It's not just a brown color..
If you want the wood to really Pop! Just put a coat of shellac on it.. Awesome!
the just walnut is likelly western or(california walnut ) which is very simuliar to black walnut or(eastern walnut) .most dealers only call the stuff from the east black walnut ,because the trees are much older being native there plus the harsh cold in winter & harsh heat in summer is part of what makes the wood darker & harder . there actually was a guy who plated many eastern walnut trees in western canada & the western states in the late 1800's/ can't remember his name right now, but in Victoria B.C there is a walnut farm with about 100- 150 trees & I am lucky enough to know the guy who has the conrtract to mill any trees that come down from stroms and what not. last year here in B.C we had some nastys ,but the good side for me anyway was I got a huge horse chestnut /walnut and a crap load of black locust!!!
sorry I got carried away , there is also little walnut/ Mexican walnut .aswell all hickory and pecan are in the walnut family. I grew up in south western Ontario &have had a love of walnut since my first cut of it 30 years ago when I was only 10. Enjoy & DON'T STAIN IT UNLESS THE CLIENT INSIST is my thought!
the woodbug Dan
Say could you tell me something about "horse chestnut" ? I've never worked chestnut but there's a lot of it where I live and I'm considering it for the dinner table.-Cameron Bobro
Horse chestnut (Aesculus sp.) is not related to true chestnut (Castanea sp.). Horse chestnut is so named because the (poisonous) fruits vaguely resemble chestnuts. The North American horse chestnut species are generally called buckeyes (e.g., sweet buckeye, Ohio buckeye, etc.). The wood is whitish and rather soft.
-Steve
the horse chestnut out here has aton of verying colours and swirling grains and is fairlly dense ,very simuliar to american chestnut I a dinning siute out of a few years back . I fined it is most like rock elm but not as hard .We got the whole tree which was about 45" around with alot of nice lighter brown heart wood . I have Romeyn Beck Hough's The woodbook in which the sample is quite plain but most of mine is .not
Edited 2/26/2008 12:32 pm ET by woodguydan
I do not know where you live but in Eastern Berks County, Pennsylvania, there is a saw mill, called Moyer's Sawmill, 361 Pearl Road, Bernville, PA 19506 (610)488-1462, run by two ladies of a 'certain age' who are amazing the way they sling the big logs into a 50" blade having a 1/4 inch kerf. Anyhow, they will cut 8' flitches two to three inches thick out of a log when they get them at a very reasonable price. I paid $150 for two such pieces years ago and air dried them.
Ask them what stock they have and if they do not have any they are accommodating to get it for you, although I waited three months before they called me.
Moyer.s Sawmill is very close to the Bethel exit on Interstate 78.
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