Lumber Update Episode 123 Difficult to Dry Woods | Featured Species: Sapele

A word of warning on this episode. New levels of nerdery on display here. If I had a white lab coat I would have worn it while recording. To sum up, woods with a higher T/R ratio will be harder to dry. But if you are like me and want to know why a higher T/R ratio is harder to dry, keep watching to dive into some organic chemistry and cellular structure.
Also I feature Sapele this month. A much more mainstream species but one worth looking at closely due to how it has taken over the Mahogany market. A reminder that Walnut tier supporters on Patreon will be getting the fancy Sapele sticker with all of the details I discuss in this episode.

Become a supporter at:

[archi-drte]

Loving this series Shannon - appreciate the video and have a great day in the shop.

[BarkingBeavers]

I already listened to this episode on spotify podcast, but had to come watch for the visuals. Thank you, Shannon! You are one of my favorite wood pros/podcasters and I value your insight!

[hamptonchildress]

Thanks for this rich and integrated wood tech nerd-out. Professional documentation tends toward dry and academic, yet your discussion connects the (fascinating) science to the boots on the ground world of woodwork. You've just increased YouTube's IQ. Mine too... I hope. 😎

[sps]

Sapele is my current favorite wood. Yes, pretty dusty, but easy to work with. Post below warns of tear out, but I don't recall any tear out. And readily available (make sure its quarter-sawn or rift sawn). My finish for sapele is 4 coats shellac, 4 coats AquaCoat grain filler, then water based poly.

[rhpsoregon]

Here in Oregon, the locally owned lumberyard/ home improvement center sells dimensional lumber, both KD (around here ~16-20% moisture) and "Standard & Better" (~25-30% moisture).

[Ramplcro]

I'm using/used Sapele for trays and ultimately el. guitar neck (my first one). Most of the pieces i have are 15 cm wide, quarter or rift sawn. It's a cross grained wood that does surprise you while hand planing. It likes to tear out pretty deeply so i would be careful. In the begining take small cuts trying to learn particular piece to minimize tear out while planing. Reasonably hard, porous but not too much. I like it. . Like the smell, and when got right, it planes/scrape nicely. P.s. i hate that f*** red dust while sawing 😄, same
At the same time i have Luan but also Meranti and at least where i got them, they are different in smell and appearance. Both are pretty lightweight (Luan is lighter), but Meranti is just gorgeous wood. Looks really nice, lot of modular (or something similar) rays and it hand planes like a butter. If it had a little bit better ding resistance it would be my favourite wood (other then ebony 😁).

[genecarden]

Shannon the cookie holding a lot of moisture is counter intuitive to me. I always understood that moisture escapes from end grain much faster( hence coating the endgrain to equalize moisture transfer. ) A cookie seems to have a disproportionate amount of endgrain. So it seems it might dry too fast. What am I missing?

[donwight]

Love it all. Great job and great information.