A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.

I know it is difficult without a picture...Any ideas on what this is?
Possibly ash???

"Graham Gilbert" wrote in message
news:xHRYi.11255$8S5.6120@edtnps82...
A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.

I know it is difficult without a picture...Any ideas on what this is?
Possibly ash???


Possibly anything. I have seen Oak on many occasions used for platforms
running up to drill rigs and to shore up sides of holes at underground pipe
repair locations.

On Fri, 09 Nov 2007 04:51:41 GMT, "Graham Gilbert"
wrote:

A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.

I know it is difficult without a picture...Any ideas on what this is?
Possibly ash???


There are thousands of different trees. Even long-time woodworkers
can be fooled by just looking at wood. Ash is usually very light in
color and somewhat heavy, but then there are probably hundreds of
different kinds of wood that match that description. Ring spacing can
be close or far apart for the same wood. You may need to do some
further detective work--find out the hardness, density, workability,
open/closed pore, steam bendability, etc. I've made several pieces
of furniture from unknown woods and they turned out beautifully.

On Nov 9, 4:51 am, "Graham Gilbert" wrote:
A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.


Ash looks a lot like oak, the most obvious difference is the absence
of
prominent ray flecks.

Ash is also a good choice for the application above as it resists
splitting
and takes shock well--hence it's traditional use in baseball bats.

--

FF

In article . com, Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
On Nov 9, 4:51 am, "Graham Gilbert" wrote:
A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.


Ash looks a lot like oak, the most obvious difference is the absence of
prominent ray flecks.

Ash is also a good choice for the application above as it resists splitting
and takes shock well--hence it's traditional use in baseball bats.

All quite true; OTOH, ash doesn't fit the OP's description of the wood as
"very heavy".

Rock elm, maybe?

--
Regards,
Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

It's time to throw all their damned tea in the harbor again.

Fri, Nov 9, 2007, 4:51am (EST+5) (Graham*Gilbert)
doth query:
snip I know it is difficult without a picture...Any ideas on what this
is? snip

Certainly. It is free wood, free wood is always popular wood.



JOAT
Viet Nam. Divorce. Cancer. Been there, done that, got over it. Now
where the Hell are my T-shirts?
- JOAT

Graham Gilbert wrote:

A neighbor picked up a bunch of "scrap" which had been used as spacers
between drill pipe. They are all 8 footers, 2 by 4, and on planing one off
they are actually quite nice. The wood is very heavy - like maple or oak,
but quite light in color and with a grain not unlike oak, fairly widely
spaced growth rings.

I know it is difficult without a picture...Any ideas on what this is?
Possibly ash???


If you really want to know, send a small sample to the Forest Products Lab
in Wi.

http://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/

Deb

On Nov 10, 1:34 am, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article . com, Fred the Red Shirt wrote:

On Nov 9, 4:51 am, "Graham Gilbert" wrote:
...

All quite true; OTOH, ash doesn't fit the OP's description of the wood as
"very heavy".

Rock elm, maybe?

Or maybe it's still green.

Isn't it commonplace to make pallets out of greenwood?

--

FF

In article . com, Fred the Red Shirt wrote:
On Nov 10, 1:34 am, (Doug Miller) wrote:
In article . com, Fred the
Red Shirt wrote:

On Nov 9, 4:51 am, "Graham Gilbert" wrote:
...

All quite true; OTOH, ash doesn't fit the OP's description of the wood as
"very heavy".

Rock elm, maybe?

Or maybe it's still green.

Isn't it commonplace to make pallets out of greenwood?

Yeah, it is. Hadn't thought about that.

--
Regards,
Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

It's time to throw all their damned tea in the harbor again.