Author Topic: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts  (Read 20732 times)

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Offline Badger

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #15 on: November 14, 2017, 11:00:07 pm »
  Willie, I found with the larch it was stiff enough that I could get the weight down right where I wanted it and still be stiff enough. I am working with some ash right now and having problems below about 250 grains with the stiffness.

Offline DC

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #16 on: November 15, 2017, 07:10:58 pm »
I think the spruce "strongest for it's weight" is in tensile strength only.

Offline willie

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #17 on: November 16, 2017, 02:43:40 pm »
Quote
I could get the weight down right where I wanted it and still be stiff enough
Steve, I presume that you are still at 11/32" diameter at the fattest part of the shaft?

Don, I don't know, the sawyer said his airplane customer said it's the strongest he's found,  must have tested it somehow, but the sawyer didn't know how. I might know more when it gets a bit drier.
« Last Edit: November 16, 2017, 02:49:21 pm by willie »

Offline Badger

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #18 on: November 16, 2017, 05:55:32 pm »
  Willie, slight above 1/4" at the fattest part for a 200 grain arrow.

Offline Marc St Louis

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #19 on: November 16, 2017, 06:01:55 pm »
I tried Ash many years ago and didn't find it to be that stiff, HHB was better.

Did a bit of research on this and I would think that a high MOE to density is what you would need.  Wood species that seem to qualify is Ramin and Purpleheart with Ramin being the better of the 2
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Offline willie

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #20 on: November 17, 2017, 01:27:11 am »
Marc,
I should have been more specific about what I am calling "relative stiffness". It is  MOE/S.G.
Haven't seen ramin in years, though it would be worth testing if you have some (and a spine tester), I could do the calcs.

Offline willie

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #21 on: November 26, 2017, 02:46:28 pm »
the samples in my warm box are about as stabilized as they are going to get. here are some values from my testing.
In addition to the heavier woods mentioned by Mark, lighter woods like spruce can be stiff for its weight, as well as some heavier pine. Stiffness and density vary quite a bit between samples, so I think it would be hard to categorize "relative stiffness"  by species alone
« Last Edit: November 26, 2017, 03:18:34 pm by willie »

Offline Jim Davis

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #22 on: January 04, 2018, 02:08:22 pm »
As the above chart indicates (I think), white spruce is a pale shadow of Sitka. Tests of black and red spruce put it right up there with Sitka in stiffness and weight considerations. It's hard to get black or red spruce and know that's what it is, because suppliers just lump white, black and red in the same batches.

I just milled out a couple dozen from what I know was black spruce (because I cut it myself 10 or 15 years ago.) It  made up the best shafts I have ever had. Haven't put them on the tester, but it is obvious that these 5/16 shafts are stiffer than my 11/32 white spruce.

I may be traveling to Maine and N.H. this summer, and if I do, I expect to come back with some more black spruce.
« Last Edit: January 04, 2018, 04:03:35 pm by Jim Davis »
Jim Davis

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Offline Badger

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #23 on: January 04, 2018, 03:37:13 pm »
  I was surprised at how badly Doug fir tested, was that fine ringed doug fir? I was also disappointed with the Larch.

Offline Marc St Louis

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #24 on: January 04, 2018, 05:13:58 pm »
I have easy access to Black Spruce, have quite a few trees growing on my property.  I made arrows out of the wood many years ago and it is quite stiff but you don't want to bend the shafts too much or they will explode
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Offline Jim Davis

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #25 on: January 04, 2018, 05:18:37 pm »
I have easy access to Black Spruce ... but you don't want to bend the shafts too much or they will explode

Same is true of other spruce,  D. fir, syp, pretty much all stiff softwoods.
Jim Davis

Kentucky--formerly Maine

Offline Hawkdancer

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #26 on: January 04, 2018, 11:02:49 pm »
Willie,
Is that commercial a US company?  Reasonable prices?
Hawkdancer
Life is far too serious to be taken that way!
Jerry

Offline willie

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #27 on: January 05, 2018, 01:33:39 am »
Quote
As the above chart indicates (I think), white spruce is a pale shadow of Sitka
Jim, I have not tested enough samples to draw many conclusions. The 2 white spruce samples came from the same board, the difference between them is one was heat treated and one was not. they measured the same before one was cooked for one hour at 325 in the oven.
the "white spruce" board was from a local (just up the road) tree and had very fine growth rings just under the bark. In fact it was not really a full board, but the slab. I was a bit disapointed in its stiffness, but some of the "sitka" I tested was not as stiff either. the "sitka" was selected for fine rings, but was not as fine ringed as what is found just under the bark in a mature tree. I have put quotes around the white and sitka because my choice of words is my way to differentiate boards on my spreadsheet. Sitka, in the case of the samples above, is used to describe five different boards purchased at a mill about an hours drive distant. In actuality, the trees from that area a bit bigger, and are called sitka by the locals there, and local trees here are more often referred to as being white. In actuality the forestry experts were called in to help settle a lawsuit many years ago, and our trees were declared to be lutz spruce, a hybrid between the two. Most of us have given up trying to differentiate.

whether it is the spruce, pine, doug fir or larch I look at, there seems to be a somewhat of correlation between stiffness and
density. The relative stiffness (column N) is MOE/ .0000001*SG

And once again, there is quite a bit of variation in stiffness within a particular species. So much that all the species might just as well simply be categorized as light med and heavy.

 Conversations with the USFS Research Station about finding high stiffness, have suggested fine rings from butt logs, but beyond that, the FS  guy says it's a guess. Perhaps some of the less dense boards I have found that meet that criteria, are getting lighter from decay?

Steve, I had a pile of square doug fir arrow blanks, and picked one I thought would be "likely" to test well. It was fairly fined grained and I too was disappointed. I also have a hundred or so larch boards drying. They are slated for trimming out a house, but when that job is done, I will have a lot left to make arrows from. the best of the two boards I have sampled would be the equivalent of 75#@11/32" diameter spine.

Offline Jim Davis

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #28 on: January 05, 2018, 10:01:30 am »
Willie, what area do you live in.  I have understood Sitka to be a coastal species, at least in northern Oregon and Washington. I assumed the same to be true in B.C.

As for  fine growth rings, James Duff thought that not so important. Most of us think less spring wood and more summer wood to be useful.

Concerning "getting lighter from decay," if the wood has be  kept dry, I  certainly would not expect that.
Jim Davis

Kentucky--formerly Maine

Offline willie

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Re: drying conifer woods for arrow shafts
« Reply #29 on: March 30, 2020, 07:49:21 pm »
Sorry for the late reply.

Quote
Concerning "getting lighter from decay," if the wood has be  kept dry, I  certainly would not expect that.

Jim, much of the local spruce comes from old growth that was never intended to be harvested. A bark beetle blight has left a lot of dead standing trees that reorganized the priorities of forest managers, creating harvest opportunities due to fire prevention initiatives. Some of it has been standing dead for a few years.

Hawk, small local mill. PM me if you are still interested.