Rambling...

[Bill Webber]

LOML gave me a few hours off on Monday. In trying to move to Pennsylvania I knew Hearnes Hardwood was nearby and I'd also been looking For Groff and Groff in Quarryville. I took the opportunity to find them both and look around. I'm told Hearnes used to be Hearnes and Groff. No info on what happened but they went there separate directions some fifteen years ago. Both places are similar. Both are several acres covered with logs and rough sawn lumber. Both have saw mills. Hearnes has a neat little showroom where most of the one-of-a-kind boards are already finished one side for display purposes. Both seem to do the same kind of business. Their business models look the same right down to the brochure for pricing. Prices at Groff and Groff are a little lower, I think.

For me, I can't imagine buying lumber at the prices at either of these places. I can't imagine sawing up $30 - $40 boards for the kinds of projects I work on. I labor enough over maximizing the use of boards as it is. I would never be able to make the first cut in boards priced like these guys have. And, I'm not talking about exotics, I'm taking about garden variety walnut or cherry. I guess I'll stick to looking for the $1 bf stuff at auctions. That is if I ever get through the pile I have. :D:D:D

Anyway, It's nice to have these places nearby for the occasional mad idea or special board.

I've finally settled on the next projects for rehabing our modest model home in PA. I'm planning a built-in to go behind the paneled wall previously mentioned. I'm also going to build a new and matching fireplace mantel and surround. The basic idea came from a mantel in Wood magazine. I've scaled their idea and design the matching built-in bookcase.

I've started pulling lumber for the bottom of the built-in. The bottom of the cabinet starts out as a face fame that gets mostly covered up with other trim. I need pieces that are 8, 6, 5, and 4 inches wide but none of them gets exposed more than 1-inch. I'm running the most nasty, knotty wood through the chrome knives on my JP that I have ever run through a machine. I figured the knives were pretty much trashed when I started, but they are doing the job quite nicely. I still haven't made a decision on how to use the knives in this planer. Right now I'm leaning towards using the chrome for initial roughing out and then using the HSS M42 for the last passes. Comments?

Most of my finish work is sprayed pre-cat lacquer. In moving to PA I'm going to need another brand and a local supplier. I'm going to need suggestions and directions for that. Jim, you out there...?

Here's a a line drawing for my new project. Working just weekends I'm wondering if this will be done by July. :rolleyes:

Regards,

Bill W.

[Don Bullock]

Bill, you should be glad you have such low prices. Prices out here in California can be a lot higher. Recently I bought some quilted maple (beautiful grain) at $23 a b/f.:eek: The going price at at least two places that I know of for high quality figured cherry is more that $12 b/f.

[Jim Becker]

I was spoiled for a few years with having a local supplier that I could buy my "garden variety" cherry from at about $3 bd ft, leaving runs to Hearne for special needs. Well, due to the local supplier dying last year and his wife selling everything off, that source has gone by the way-side. I do have a nice stash of cherry from Mike Morgan that I've been using, but have bought more from Hearne lately simply because I was looking for specific features.

That all said, I will always feel that the first step in finishing a project is choosing the material. When I work with a board, I'm always trying to maximize the beauty, grain direction, color, etc., as the top priority. (sometimes plotting out a component not even parallel to an original edge) When I look at the end result, I never think about the cost of the material...rather I consider if I did a good job at making things work well together. In the vanities I've been finishing up, all the bottom rails of the doors are from the same piece and are in order across the room. Same for the top rails. Siles were handled similarly. The wide board that the three top drawers are faced with are in one continuous piece outside of the necessary saw kerfs so the drawers can open. The three lower doors are from another board that is very similar in grain to that top board. It took me a long time to choose which boards I'd use for what. Several of them were from my last purchase from Mike; the rest came from Hearne.

My real problem going to Hearne isn't the material I went to buy as I knew pretty much what I was looking at for QS cherry. It was the English Brown Oak and figured English sycamore I also came home with...LOL :eek: Candy store...:D

The one good thing about buying nice wood is that if you really get stuck, you can generally always sell it for more than you paid. And those special boards only come along once in awhile...