I never wanted to grow up to be a Lumber Miller!

[Julie Moriarty]

Breaktime!

I was just down in the shop ripping 8/4 sapele (up to 17" wide and up to 9+ feet long) to 6-9" widths then resawing it to 1/2". I felt like a mill!

Next comes the planing. But that's the easy part.

[John Piwaron]

That sounds suspiciously like bragging. :) Nice wood!

[Julie Moriarty]

Believe me it's not bragging! It beat me up pretty badly. For every step, I have to move tools around and every time I do I curse the fact I went on the cheap buying the wheels. They worked fine with no load. DUH! I really had no idea what I was getting myself into. All this to save about $500 on the wood because the hardwood store could only get 2 thicknesses out of the 8/4 and I was able to get 3.

I'm almost done. Just a few more passes through the planer. I hope this turns out like I envision. :confused:

[Joe Angrisani]

Have you ever used sapele? You're gonna love it. Used quartersawn sapele on our master vanity.

256579256580

If you haven't used it before, I'd suggest try several different finishing paths on some scrap. The difference in what "popped" in the figure was largely based on the finish. I found a first coat of BLO made the dark side of the figure more prominant. Skipping that and starting with a clear poly finish made the light side of the figure just glow. I tried satin Minwax wipe-on, gloss Minwax wipe-on, and satin Minwax brush-on (because that's what I had around), and found all three were quite different. Some much clearer and brighter than others. We settled on 3 coats of wipe-on gloss followed by a couple coats of wipe-on satin (usual kiss-sanding between coats).

Point is: Try some different finishing choices on that beautiful sapele figure to see what you like.

[Julie Moriarty]

http://i867.photobucket.com/albums/ab233/jules42651/Woodworking/Kitchen%20Cabinets/mah_sap_02_zps393c9748.jpg
This is a really poor picture. It doesn't show the colors well at all. Anyway, we were experimenting with dyes on mahogany to see how it might contrast with sapele. The doors will be mahogany rails & stiles and sapele panels. The face frame will be ebonized oak. Mineral spirits give you a fairly good idea how dark the wood will get with a finish but not much else. Your pieces turned out very well. I've seen some other sapele results and the wood looks gorgeous.

This whole thing started when I was at the hardwood store and saw a cart of genuine mahogany 1/2 price. Since the GM is flat sawn, we needed a panel with straight grain. I was forbidden to look at rift or quarter sawn oak. :rolleyes: The only other choices I could find there were African Mahogany and sapele. The AF was way too dark. And the QS sapele was all 8/4 with live edges. The doors will be a Mission style so we needed a 1/2" panel. The hardwood store said their resaw saw lost 1/4" per cut. And that started a process that led to the mill. :o

If I knew then what I know now... I'm just keeping my fingers crossed this will turn out like I hope. http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/images/smilies/nerves.gif

[guy knight]

here is some sappele

http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r148/guyknight/furniture/P1000861.jpg
http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r148/guyknight/furniture/P1000859.jpg
http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r148/guyknight/furniture/P1000858.jpg