Pecan wood


houstonwoodworker

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Pecan is in the hickory family and behaves very similar to hickory. Tough to dry without checking or splitting. With that said it, being in the hickory family it is strong and has good shock resistance. Sounds like a solid choice for a workbench to me. I agree that you should check the moisture, but I wouldn't be to concerned if it was in the 12% range for a workbench.

I had the opportunity to mill some this past winter, 10 ft log that was 32" wide. Tough going with my chainsaw mill but it had some pretty figure and spalting. Not sure what I'll use for but I have to see how it dries first. Love to see how your workbench turns out if you use it and I'd love to hear how it worked with your tools/blades and etc.

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3 hours ago, houstonwoodworker said:

Is pecan lumber a good choice for a roubo style workbench? I have a local source that is very inexpensive!

Just a word about Pecan.  Be sure to keep you're sharpening stones handy when working with it.  It's more like hickory than anyone has mentioned.  It will dull any sharp tool within 3 feet in almost no time at all.

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For what it's worth, Jay Bates recently built a Roubo-ish bench of all hickory. It is lovely to look at, but he says it is murder to chop mortises on. Hickory (and its close cousin, pecan) are very hard, and resilient. The springiness makes for great axe and hammer handles, but provides a lot of "bounce" when hammered against. Jay says his left hand gets numb from holding the mortising chisel when using the hickory bench, but not on his other bench, a Roubo-ish model of SYP.

However, a hickory or pecan bench should last several lifetimes.

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7 hours ago, wtnhighlander said:

For what it's worth, Jay Bates recently built a Roubo-ish bench of all hickory. It is lovely to look at, but he says it is murder to chop mortises on. Hickory (and its close cousin, pecan) are very hard, and resilient. The springiness makes for great axe and hammer handles, but provides a lot of "bounce" when hammered against. Jay says his left hand gets numb from holding the mortising chisel when using the hickory bench, but not on his other bench, a Roubo-ish model of SYP.

However, a hickory or pecan bench should last several lifetimes.

Seems a silicone mat would care for that quite well. No?

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On 8/18/2018 at 1:49 PM, RichardA said:

Just a word about Pecan.  Be sure to keep you're sharpening stones handy when working with it.  It's more like hickory than anyone has mentioned.  It will dull any sharp tool within 3 feet in almost no time at all.

So true.  When I finish a pecan hutch that is part of my portfolio I send many of the cutters out for sharpening.  I enjoy working with it but, it is tough on tools.

 

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