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Thread: How thin must cherry be to be bent when laminating?

  1. #1

    How thin must cherry be to be bent when laminating?

    I am building a Morris chair using cherry. It will have bowed arms that will be 1and1/4" thick. The arms will be formed of laminated strips. For those of you that have bent cherry how thin should the cherry be so that it can be bent? I'm thinking 3/8" thick cherry should be ok to be slightly bent. From your experience is this too thick? Must I go thinner? I'd like to get the proper thickness using as few pieces as necessary. Thanks.

  2. #2
    Quote Originally Posted by James Spillman View Post
    I am building a Morris chair using cherry. It will have bowed arms that will be 1and1/4" thick. The arms will be formed of laminated strips. For those of you that have bent cherry how thin should the cherry be so that it can be bent? I'm thinking 3/8" thick cherry should be ok to be slightly bent. From your experience is this too thick? Must I go thinner? I'd like to get the proper thickness using as few pieces as necessary. Thanks.
    Ive used cherry quite a bit and 3/8” won’t bend much at all. I’m thinking 1/16” unless you steam it. Hopefully somebody with more bending experience will chime in.

  3. #3
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    You don't bother to specify the radius of curvature, which has everything to do with how thin the laminations must be, but I would try a sample using at the very least 5 laminations.
    "Anything seems possible when you don't know what you're doing."

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  5. #5
    I don't know the radius of the curvature. I would say the armrests have a "slight" bend. The arms are 36" long and do not curve more than 3"over the entire length. I probably will cut a 3/8" thick sample piece and see how that piece fits the form.

  6. #6
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    Years ago, I steam bent cherry to for the top on a crib I made for my daughter. 3/8" cherry steamed for nearly an hour had a working time in seconds and needed clamps to bend it. There was significant spring back.
    Lee Schierer
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  7. #7
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    I routinely bend cherry in the 3/32" range for guitar sides and such, using a short piece of copper pipe with a propane torch tip inside turned down very low. I wet the wood and bend it over the hot pipe, which momentarily turns the water to steam in the area that is touching the pipe. Using this technique I also bent cherry for the stems of a wood strip canoe, and that cherry was about 1/8" thick but only an inch wide or a bit more. Any more than 1/8" will not be easy to bend on a pipe, and while it may be possible to bend it cold I doubt if it will stay bent very well, as it would always be trying to return to straight. I have no experience with a steam box, but I'd like to try someday.

  8. #8
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    I am first experimenting with bending cherry but across the grain to make a 3/8" thick back splat for a chair. The bend is only 3/8" across 4-1/2" wide. The first trial with flat sawn stock cracked along the grain on the back. The quarter sawn stock was a success. The actual splat is rift sawn on one edge and flat sawn along the other edge and it turned out well.

    With these mixed results, my guess is that 3/8" cherry is too thick to laminate and bending it would take more energy than I can muster. Good luck and let us know what you learn.
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