oak (red/white), hickory, birch, walnut, cherry, maple?

[Kenny King]

Which of the local northeast hardwoods do you find easiest to work with?

I'ld like to get something that has nice figure.

This following info is all based on reading and not experience. I would sure love to get some feed back on what kind of hardwoods folks favor and why.

I live in the philly area, and these are supposed be local hardwoods

hickory - this is supposed to be the toughest wood of all NE woods and hard to machine

white oak - looks good, I like the quartersawn for panels, machines well
red oak - can't find #1 common for cheap, but sounds good, machines well, might be too plain, what is "penn oak"

maple (hard) - heard this was tough to work with, burns easily, dulls bits and blades

maple (soft) - heard this was easier than hard maple, not sure if it burns easily

walnut - kinda dark, but maybe best for machining, softer than oak

cherry - this is a little softer than walnut, but burns easily.

Overall, I'm leaning towards oak, walnut and cherry.

- kenny king
(novice woodworker)

[Chris Rosenberger]

Overall, I'm leaning towards oak, walnut and cherry.

- kenny king
(novice woodworker)

Those are good choices.

[Jim Becker]

I work primarily in Cherry, Walnut and Poplar. All are locally harvested...in fact, the walnut and poplar I've been using are off our property. Cherry is my "first love", however, when it comes to wood species. I generally don't do oak...purely preference...but do use ash for certain components, such as spindles for the chair project I've been procrastinating on for, umm...way too long. I also use some maple, usually in combination with walnut or cherry as an accent, but I do have some nice figured stock in my rack for that "special project" when I happen to think of what that might be... ;)

[Bob Oehler]

My 2 cents are on Black Walnut 1st and Cherry 2nd, White oak 3rd, Maple 4th and Red Oak 5th.

These are not in order of how they work but how I like them. But Walnut is also my 1st choice of easy to work with. 90% of the wood I work is localy cut and air dried. The white oak is a real treat:( with stress reliving while sawing and machining from the rough board. Twist and shout ( me shouting :D ) I do not know how it reacts as bad if it was kiln dried.

I guess red oak would be the 2nd easy to machine then white oak then cherry then last hard maple.

Have a great day.
Bob Oehler

[Kenny King]

Jim

thanks again for you helpful response. Based on an earlier post, I'm going with dados instead of biscuits. I've redrawn my plans (by hand - geesh) and have a good idea of how much hardwood i need.

I spoke with Simmi Agin (based on earlier searches through the creek) and he has some ruff sawn penn oak, cherry, and walnut. He didn't seem to favor the cherry, since he said it was hard to work with for a novice. He doesn't do any planing of the lumber either, but that might be OK. I have some freinds in the Carpenter's union that could possibly help me joint and plane the lumber.

I noticed that you really like working with cherry. It's as soft as walnut, but I've heard it burns easily. I like the idea of working with cherry. I'm thinking walnut rails/stiles with cherry panels or quartersawn oak panels. Would cherry be OK for a novice?

Groff & Groff Lumber has some #1 walnut at decent prices, and they'll do S2S for $.10 a BF. That's about the best deal i've found for lumber. Do you any experience with Groff & Groff?

Thanks again for helpful advice.

- kenny king

[Jim Becker]

I buy most of my cherry from Simmie and it's very nice stuff at a resonable price. (cash only in case you didn't know that) I don't find it difficult to work with. Properly aligned tools and sharp cutters minimize "burning"...which is a result of friction with any high-sugar wood like cherry and maple.

[lou sansone]

all of the woods you have mentioned have their place depending on the style of furniture you are making. I primarly work in the 18th century period in american furniture. In that period you are going to find cherry, maple ( often tiger ) and to a lesser extent walnut ( for chairs you will find ash and pine for seats and such ). If you move into the 17th century you are now going to be working with walnut and oak. So it does depend on the period. I should also mention that in the 18th century mahogany was very popular as well, but since you are talking about domestic woods we will leave that alone for now.

In country pieces you will often find poplar and pine being used throughout.

I have built quite a bit using cherry maple and walnut. Each have their +/-'s. I really like working with figured wood, but it can be frustrating at times.

lou

[Keith Christopher]

Sadly my fav is not in the list. I am really liking mahogany. I like the way it mills (although it does tend to be splintery) and is durable. I would however not recommend making splines from it I typically make all my hidden splines from oak. But to pick from your list, I would have to say hard maple. Yeah it burns if the feed rate is too slow, haven't noticed it dulling any tools more than any other. I typically don't like walnut to work, but I love the look of it. dunno why. And I usually only use oak for craftsman style stuff. I like poplar also, but mostly for mock-ups. gonna be working with birch soon (just bought a bunch and I'll be posting project pics soon) I am thinking of ebonizing it for the work I'm doing. I also have to admit sometimes it is fun working with pine, it's amazing to go from the effort to mill a dense wood and then have a wood that just seems to "fall" through the tool and it's milled. Hand cut mortises in YP barely need a hammer. I LOVE the whitness of ash but the only mishap in my shop came when I was squaring the end of a VERY short cabri leg made from ash, the blade bit, locked up sending the energy up my arm (holding the saw) and thru the piece. Ripped it from my hand the hook on the end of the leg ripped it from my hand dragging a nice cut in the palm and pulling my hand towards the blade. Happened in a second I tell ya. Thank goodness there was a saw brake on my miter saw. the saw pulled loose from bench and jumped up in the air a little. So my superstitions about Ash exist.

So

Mahogany (I know not on the list) 1 ,

From the list

Cherry 1
Hard Maple 2
Soft maple 3
Walnut 4
Oak wt/red 4


My current least favorite to work with at all. Lyptus.

I know it's beautiful and is so so dense and heavy, BUT IF I GET ANOTHER splinter from the stuff, it's all firewood. :P (got one under my pinky nail last night. I mean under.) I've never gotten so many splinters from a hardwood in my life.

[Jeff Sudmeier]

My personal favorite is Cherry. I built LOML's blanket chest out of it, my first "real" project. So no, Cherry isn't a bad wood for a novice.

Lately I have been working a lot of Red Oak, I really like the looks of it as well. The next few projects will be in cherry and after that probably walnut.

So, take your pick of what LOOKS best, they are all close enough that I wouldn't worry about machining/etc.

[Joseph N. Myers]

Walnut is my all time favorite because of machining, looks, finishing, etc. I make a lot of stuff out of it and it always come out looking great.
Second favorite is white oak, mainly because of its look, strength and it is an outside wood (versus red oak which falls apart if outdoors and/or gets wet).

Third is cedar mainly because I do a lot of outside crafts such as planters and it is one of the best outside wood, machines very well, stains, etc. But cedar is a pain to get color match and getting it in off sizes, i.e., mostly standard dimensions.

I have and use both cherry and maple. Cherry burns and stains poorly but looks great but gets darker with age and/or sunlight. A good substitute for cherry (because it doesn't get darker and stains better) is maple but that also burns easily and is hard on tools.

Poplar is pretty nice to work with. I sell a lot to scrollsawers for their projects. It is stronger than both basswood and balsa making it a good wood for scroll sawing.

I love locust because of color, strength and outdoor use (will easily lasts 100 to 300 years outdoors). The weight of locust is one of its major problems along with its availability.

I think Groft & Groft used to be part of Hearne Lumber (south of Phila) but they broke up some 8 years ago and Groft is now in Quarryville, PA, upwards to a couple of hours west of Phila. Between Groft and Hearne, I would definitely go with Hearne. I’ve never bought anything from them but have seen them at shows and many of the forum members have spoke highly of them.

I do have some hickory and it is beautiful but heavy (and I’m sure hard on tools). I have basswood and use it for stickers for air drying lumber.

And finally pine. I have some furniture grade pine that I use sometimes and looks pretty good. However, when I go to sand it, it gums up the sandpaper. This is especially true when I run it through my drum sander --- always seem to hit a "pitch pocket" right after I put in a new belt.

Regards, Joe

[Walt Pater]

Don't neglect butternut- Its grain is a bit of an oak/walnut hybrid, and it is easy to work with.

[Bob Johnson2]

Been using hard maple lately (a couple bathrooms), no problem with burning, if it's dulled anything I have yet to see it. So far I like the way it works, comes out of the shaper beautifully. Can't saw about finishing though, haven't done it yet.

[Andy London]

Cherry is my second favorite, Birdseye would be my first. The easiest to work with in your list would be Walnut (IMO), maple and birch are very similar, hickory is o.k. but it does tend to splinter. If you are going for figure, curly maple of curly birch would be my choice but then again I love flame Cherry and curly cherry:)

I dunno.....try them all :rolleyes:

Here is a curly cherry tray I made a couple of weeks ago, the cherry I ordered was to be regular but most of the pieces I have tried so far have been amazing.

http://www.picframer.ca/curlycherry1.jpg

[Jim Dannels]

Well I have to say red oak is my favorite to work with.

And I think PENN OAK is actually Pin Oak a variety of red oak?
Red Oak, White Oak, Burr Oak,scrub oak, and Pin Oak are common in Iowa.

[Paul Canaris]

Walnut is almost as good as <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:country-region><st1:place>Honduras</st1:place></st1:country-region> mahogany is terms of workability, IMHO. And I feel there is nothing better than HM, hope that puts it into perspective.

[Rick Thom]

Kenny, sounds like I am a few steps ahead of you in experimenting with different woods.
Suppose there are a few different operations to consider; cost/availability, working/ machining, finishing.
I have found best luck so far with cherry and maple (either hard or soft). To machine they are about like hard butter. There are a number of different ways to finish that give satisfactory results. Each species gives you a good platform and you can get variations that give somewhat different end results ie plain, curley, birdseye, etc.
As with all the woods, you've got to have sharp, fairly accurate tools. This not only gives you clean, precise cuts, but also lessens burning, sanding etc. I think maybe safety plays in here somewhere too.
Good luck and post some pics when you get some projects underway.

[Jerry Olexa]

You have a pretty good handle on this. My favorite is Cherry but it burns easily. You have to work quickly on router table or TS. G'Luck

[scott spencer]

The only birch I've worked with seems incredibly workable, but isn't overly pretty wood. Black walnut works pretty well too. Cherry has nice color and grain, but is a bit more prone to tearout, and is definitely prone to burning. Oak works well but exists in every home in North America! (Ash is nice...). White is a very cool wood, works well but not quite as well as red oak in my experience. I've got one small piece of hickory that I've hadn't cut yet, but it sure is heavy for the size of it....feels denser than hard maple. Some of the figured maple is incredible looking stuff, but it's hard and the more figure it has the harder it is to work.