Advice for a Newbie on Milling?

[Art Davis]

I posted a question/gripe about milling a couple of days ago and got good advice---to get some relatively inexpensive wood and do some sawdust generating---and I am acting on it.

In the meantime, I decided to play around with some scrap in my shop. I took a badly bowed two-by-four and cut it into two four foot segments. (Wanted to see if four foot lengths could be jointed well on my 6 inch jointer.)

I followed the procedure I had acquired by searching here and reading the mags. Put a wiggly line on one edge, placed the tips down (inverted U) and ran it through the jointer until the wiggly line was gone, then made a few more passes until the edge look straight when held up to the light. I made sure I didn't press down hard, thereby distorting the natural shape. Then I did the same to one face. Looking good. Ran it through my planer, and guess what? It was pretty badly bowed again! Ran it through the jointer several times again until one face was flat.

Then I went to my table saw and ripped it to a couple of inches in width, keeping the jointed edge against the fence.

Uh-oh!!! The ripped piece had acquired a remarkable curve side-to-side (forgot what this is called---I think bow is relative to the flat sides, no?). I guess the stresses rearranged themselves inside the wood and distorted it.

Well, how about a piece of hardwood? Took a small piece of redoak, about an inch wide, 3/4 stock. Jointed one edge and one face. Both looked great. Then, on to the planer, where I ran it through several times. Huh-oh! Now it was bowed (flat side to flat side) again! Of course I could flex it back into shape by twisting it by hand.

Okay, so apparently the wood has a mind of its own. Am I doing something wrong? If I keep up this process, I'll be left with nothing but toothpicks? And even if I am finally able to get a stable end product, how much oversize do I have to go to get a particularly thickness and width?

There is clearly some major and fundamental point I am missing, but---Heck! I don't know what!

Can you help?

Sleepless in Shady Cove,

Art

[Brian Hale]

Always try to take an equal amount of wood from both sides of the board. In other words, (3) 1/16" passes on the jointer and (3) 1/16" passes thru the planer. Of course some boards will have a mind of their own and you'll fight them to sawdust.

Brian :)

[Art Davis]

Thanks a lot, Brian. I think your suggestion is a good one and will help.

But I have been surprised that no one else is interested in this topic. Surely someone else can help me out here, too! After working with more stock, I can kinda' see now that I was tackling the toughest possible scenario: poor wood, long piece and good wood, but very thin piece. I have had better luck with good hardwood, fairly wide, not too long pieces.

But surely some of you folks have tackled these problems and would be willing to share your wisdom----.

Thanks.

Art

[Pete Brown]

I'm not surprised on the 2x4 as those usually are really bad wood, and are quite wet.

On the red oak, any idea where it was stored and for how long? It's possible that it too had moisture problems.

The steps you took sounded correct to me. I usually face joint before I edge joint, but that won't make much of a difference. It does allow me to have a flat face against the fence for the edge jointing, which I find easier than keeping a narrow edge against the fence.

Anyway, I suspect either very bad wood or insufficient acclimation as the main issue. I also agree with the others who pointed out taking equal amounts off each face.

I've been dealing with figured soft maple lately, and that stuff definitely has a mind of its own (grain runs every which way and is touch to machine sometimes), but I have had good success following the "equal amounts" rule.

Pete

[Pete Brown]

But I have been surprised that no one else is interested in this topic.

Keep in mind that once somthing gets bumped off the front page, your changes of a reply go way way down.

Pete

[Alan Turner]

Your procedure sounds about right. The 2x4 is poor wood regardless, and so I am not surprised. On the red oak, that is a pretty small piece and sometimes they are a bit of trouble. Try some larger stock and see what happens. It may just be the two woods you selected.

[Dan Lyke]

I'm a newbie too, but I've gone the (shhh, don't tell anyone or we'll start a flame war) Festool route. So for braces for a router table (actually, a platform that'll extend off of an existing table) I bought some kiln dried 2x4 and 2x6 fir, laid a guide rail down the length of it, ran the circular sawn down it to rip 3/4" off either side, ripped another little bit off, and ended up with wood that, over the 2' and 3' spans I'm using it's as flat as any reference surface I can come up with.

I think the key is making sure the stock is well dried (I'm in Northern California, where in summer we can store cardboard outside for months, and the rainy season has been mild so far this year), ripping incremental bits off of each side so that as it flattens and twists you get a lot of the surface tensions out of it, and not being afraid to throw away a good bit of wood.

But a couple of pieces of kiln dried fir are also not a statistically valid sample.

[Art Davis]

Thanks for the input folks. I tried milling some shorter pieces of red oak that were wider (4-5 inches or so), and it worked like a charm! I think I just unwittingly chose two very rough things to mill for a first shot. Luck of the newbie, I guess, hunh?

I will do the face milling first as suggested. Makes a lot of sense. I suppose very narrow strips don't have to be that straight anyway, if one can flex them back straight---because they would not tend to be structural support pieces I guess.

Gee, this forum is certainly popular. As someone mentioned, it doesn't take long at all for a thread to drop out of sight.