Red Cedar tips?

[Rob Luter]

I got inspired by Rafael Herrera’s thread on an oilstone box and decided to whip one up for a loose stone I have. I grabbed a couple pieces of red cedar from the bonepile, perfectly quarter sawn and with exceptionally tight growth rings. I’ve always loved the look of cedar, but it’s so soft I have a tough time with chisel work, especially on the end grain. It wants to collapse and tear before cutting, even using freshly honed tools. Any tips to share for working soft wood? Is it just a matter of lighter cuts and shallower grind angles?

[Michael Bulatowicz]

If you’re using tools that are already as sharp as you can get them, my limited experience says (in addition to light cuts):
1. Follow the growth rings: you’ll get a cleaner cut along the rings than across them.
2. Skew the cut. Adjust the skew angle based on the direction of the growth rings: basically, try to avoid crushing the soft earlywood against the much harder latewood and vice versa.
3. Use a slicing motion (depending on the tool) rather than just a straight push
I have some pine in my garage that I would describe as positively spongy in the fast growth aspect as well as fast growing (widely spaced growth rings), to the point that no matter how sharp I made my tools I was getting tearing at first. I kept at it and figured out how to cleanly finish the end grain. The same techniques worked well for the dovetail end grain on the cedar footrest I made with wood that was left over from building my deck.

[Jim Koepke]

Cedar can be tricky. It doesn't have as much resin in the structure to help hold the fibers together.

My favorite low angle chisel has to be freshly sharpened (15º bevel) to get a cleanish cut.

jtk

[Matt Evans]

Very sharp, very light cuts, skewing the cut helps. The only other thing I'd mention is that a chisel with a more acute angle on it helps a lot as well. Since cuts are light in a very soft wood durability of the edge isn't quite as important.

[Rob Luter]

Thanks for the tips. That's pretty much how it played out. A narrow chisel with a keen edge seemed to work OK, but the wider the chisel got the more trouble I had. Cleaning up the long edge of the recess for the stone was impossible with a 1", 25* chisel no matter how sharp. I wound up using a utility knife and a straight edge. Chamfering the ends of the box was accomplished with a 60 1/2 set to a light cut and very tight mouth, and skewed 45*. The surface is still pretty fuzzy. Other operations worked out OK though. Truing up the face grain and edge grain went well using a 47* (35 + 12) cutting angle on a LA Jack. Using a router plane to true up the bottoms of the recesses was a cakewalk. I might as well have been carving soap.

I hit the whole box with a healthy dose of Danish oil last night. It sure is thirsty wood! I'm hoping that once it cures it will stabilize the wood a little for subsequent finishing steps.