[pianotech] Tool for Wood Selection at Lumberyard

[Terry Farrell]

Well, Sitka is preferable because it is the highest strength/weight  
ratio wood out there.

And just what is "tone grade spruce?"

Terry Farrell

On Jul 30, 2010, at 9:13 PM, jimialeggio wrote:

> Hi Terry,
>
> This is an interesting question, especially with tone grade spruce.
>
> After a number of bad, expensive Sitka purchases I've taken a  
> different route. As you mention, its hard to see the endgrain and/or  
> differentiate endgrain from endgrain saw marks. Another problem is  
> that run-out can blow away stock quite aggressively, and in my  
> experience its hard if not impossible to read the runout in the  
> rough stock. I'm giving up on wholesalers who are fine for lots of  
> other stuff, but not for this particular application.
>
> So I'm taking a different route. Future purchases will be red spruce  
> which is indigenous and plentiful in NE.   Not only that, and this  
> is the kicker for me, there are any number of small, 1 or 2 man  
> quarter and radial sawn specialists in NE that I can talk to in  
> person, and specify exactly what I want before they saw...and I  
> don't need to buy 1000bf...2-3 hundred is fine.
>
> Red Spruce's strength #'s are very close to sitka's, and  I'm of the  
> opinion that the spruce used for any board RC&S or otherwise is more  
> dependent the empirical experience of seeing how it performs in  
> relation to the spreadsheet predictions rather than assuming that  
> only one wood, ie sitka,  will work.  I actually think that sitka is  
> the default rc&s wood, because, quite reasonably it is indigenous to  
> Washington State where Del was developing his approach to  rc&s   
> design.
>
> Doesn't answer your reading-the- endgrain question, but I understand  
> why you want to be careful.
>
> Jim I
>
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Jim Ialeggio
> grandpianosolutions.com
> 978- 425-9026
> Shirley, MA
>