Wood ID

[MattF]

I have had these three pieces of wood for about a year just hanging out in the garage. I think its time to do something with them. I am thinking a nice mallet.

Maple, Walnut, and not sure of the other. Anyone have any guesses?

[Dknapp34]

It does look like Elm or Ash.  Also could be cherry with a lot of sap wood.  If it's ash it would be a lot harder than cherry or elm.   

[MattF]

3 minutes ago, Dknapp34 said:

It does look like Elm or Ash.  Also could be cherry with a lot of sap wood.  If it's ash it would be a lot harder than cherry or elm.   

It gave my table saw a hard time. Granted its not the best saw, Rigid 4512. Just looked at some images of Ash, and I think yall are correct.

[MattF]

1 minute ago, Mike. said:

If I had to guess between Elm and Ash, I'd say elm, because Elm has that feathering between the growth rings.  But with straight grain it is hard to tell.  Some elms are harder than others - I think Red Elm is harder and has more color.  White elm is softer and looks a little more grey.  

With a finely sanded shot of the end grain @phinds should be able to tell without a problem.  

I will do that this evening and post a pic. 

[Chestnut]

I'd lean towards elm. There is a larger difference between the heart wood and sap wood color. Though this doesn't mean much woods can vary in color from tree to tree. I could tell by smell ash is very distinct. If it's hard I'd lean towards ash but there is rock elm which is nearly as hard as ash.

[Eric.]

Grade A genuine Cletus.

[MattF]

4 minutes ago, Eric. said:

Grade A genuine Cletus.

Define cletus please. Its not wearing Teva sandals with socks and a fanny pack.

[Eric.]

You're thinking of Rainbow River Sunshine Daydream.  Cletus wears Wolverine boots and dirty Wranglers.  He doesn't spell so good and he hasn't been to the dentist in about 30 years.

[MattF]

35 minutes ago, Eric. said:

You're thinking of Rainbow River Sunshine Daydream.  Cletus wears Wolverine boots and dirty Wranglers.  He doesn't spell so good and he hasn't been to the dentist in about 30 years.

I have been wrong all these years! Learn something new everyday!

[phinds]

On 9/30/2016 at 10:50 AM, MattF said:

I will do that this evening and post a pic. 

I see you didn't post an end grain shot but really, you shouldn't need to because ash and elm are trivially easy to tell apart. Just do a mild cleanup on the end grain and see if it has ulmform pores. If it does it's elm, if not, not. The very NAME "ulmiform" comes from the botanical genus name for elm (Ulmus). There are only a couple of other woods that have that construct.

Ulmiform pores are the wavy banks in the end grain shown on the left of this image. These wavy bands in the pore distribution lead to another characteristic, also shown in the image, of what I call "feathering" in the face grain, seen on the right

Compare this to the ash end grain. See both on my site.

[MattF]

21 hours ago, phinds said:

I see you didn't post an end grain shot but really, you shouldn't need to because ash and elm are trivially easy to tell apart. Just do a mild cleanup on the end grain and see if it has ulmform pores. If it does it's elm, if not, not. The very NAME "ulmiform" comes from the botanical genus name for elm (Ulmus). There are only a couple of other woods that have that construct.

Ulmiform pores are the wavy banks in the end grain shown on the left of this image. These wavy bands in the pore distribution lead to another characteristic, also shown in the image, of what I call "feathering" in the face grain, seen on the right

Compare this to the ash end grain. See both on my site.

Life got in the way. Slammed at work. I will try that this evening.

 

Thank you for the info.