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Ring shake

Started by HOOF-ER, June 08, 2008, 01:13:44 PM

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HOOF-ER

This is a hickory I cut the other day. Read about ring shake , wanted to get you opinions. This tree yieded 5 -10' logs and one 8'. Very little to no taper. But the checks in the log were visible immediately. Is this ring shake? Will these be worth while sawing? Just flat saw and get what you can?
Home built swing mill, 27hp Kawasaki

Don P

Looks like it to me. Looks like you can saw around the heart and get some good sapwood boards.

oldsaw

Yep, just don't know how bad it is until you open the log.  It doesn't bode well though.  Sawwood and I did a cherry about 3 or 4 years ago that was a nightmare.  A 5 way codom that had sustained some trunk damage from a car impact as well.  It was a mess.  Got some okay wood out of it, but lost a lot as well.

Mark
So many trees, so little money, even less time.

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Tom


Captain

Don't you love having Tom around?   :)

kelLOGg

What causes ring shake? I've seen it before but never knew what it was called. It sure facilitates splitting firewood  ;D
Bob
Cook's MP-32, 20HP, 20' (modified w/ power feed, up/down, loader/turner)
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Tom

ring shake is usually caused by a fungus infection (some blame bacteria) in the tree that weakens the bonds of the cells between the early wood (summer wood) and the late wood (winter wood).

Dr. Shigo studied it in relation to Sapsucker damage here at this link (X).

It is commonly called wind-shake, but is now attributed to disease.  The same physical stresses that were once blamed for the shake still may be responsible for the separation of the diseased wood but it has been found that they aren't the cause.

woodmills1

nice pix and info tom


a tree like that may yield some great boards just work around the ring shake as soon as you see it in the face of the cut on the mill
James Mills,Lovely wife,collect old tools,vacuuming fool,36 bdft/hr,oak paper cutter,ebonic yooper rapper nauga seller, Blue Ox? its not fast, 2 cat family, LT70,edger, 375 bd ft/hr, we like Bob,free heat,no oil 12 years,big splitter, baked stuffed lobster, still cuttin the logs dere IAM

HOOF-ER

Thanks for the input guys. Tom great critique, you might consider powerpoint makes awesome presentations. :D :D  My take on this tree is; it was very tall 80'? and in a low spot. I think it caught some wind (at some point), it had no limbs. Some idiots pretending to be a tree service did the no limbs, why I have no idea. When we dropped it , it made an impressive thud. When bucking it I noticed the cracks already. Just  want to confirm what I thought. Thanks.
Home built swing mill, 27hp Kawasaki

Ron Wenrich

Hickory is a stress filled wood.  I have seen hickory crack to pieces while sitting in the yard.  Most other woods don't do that.  Right now, I have about 5 Mbf of hickory sitting in the yard to be sawn.  We'll be sawing it probably today. 

Ring shake is supposed to be from disease.  The most susceptable of those is sycamore, hemlock, elm, gum, and oak, especially black and pin; at least in my neck of the woods.  Oak often has a bad smell associated with shake. 

I don't notice any odor with the shake in hickory.  I often wonder if the shake isn't more due to stress along a growth ring instead of disease. 

We are usually able to saw around the shake and not lose too much to the defect.  Hickory is a nice wood, but really hard.  Don't let them lay too long or you'll be sorry. 
Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large groups.

Don P

The pic and some shakey hickory I've been working do not have the black in the shake that I associate with bacterial infection when I see shake in something like black locust or oak. I think in hickory you may be right Ron.

Brucer

Shake is certainly related to wind in the western softwoods. I will not touch logs from certain areas around here, because they are guaranteed to have shake. These areas invariably have higher and more frequent winds.

What Tom has labelled a heart check is called heart shake in Canada. It's distinguished by the fact that the split is widest at the pith.

In softwoods, when there's shake of any kind present, 90% of the time there will be hidden cracks that come to light when you saw the log open. If a conifer with shake dies, the sap will settle into the shake and gradually force the fibers apart. When you saw a board or timber from this type of wood, it will literally fall apart.
Bruce    LT40HDG28 bandsaw
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers."

Tom

that is strange, brucer.  Down here the Heart Check is sometimes called a Heart Shake also.   I was corrected one time about using shake instead of check and so I changed my word.

Technically, shake is when the growth rings separate and the crack is parallel to the growth rings.   Check is when the crack crosses the growth rings and is perpendicular to them.   You are the first that I've heard to make the distinction in a long, long time.

I was also corrected about catching the fish that I called a Snook (sn-ooo-k).  Every body called them that, it seemed.   It rhymed with boot.  Then I was corrected and told that it was sn-uu-k.  That "you don't say loook, you say look".   I changed then too, but I still think Snooook.   :D

That separation that fills with resin, we call a pitch pocket.   It will have handfuls in it, sometimes.

Brucer

Quote from: Tom on June 15, 2008, 10:56:48 AM
Down here the Heart Check is sometimes called a Heart Shake also.   I was corrected one time about using shake instead of check and so I changed my word.

Technically, shake is when the growth rings separate and the crack is parallel to the growth rings.   Check is when the crack crosses the growth rings and is perpendicular to them.   You are the first that I've heard to make the distinction in a long, long time.

Here's a quote from the National Lumber Grades Authority (A Canadian organization): "SHAKE - a lengthwise separation of the wood which occurs between or through the rings of growth."

They make a point of distinguishing between heart shake and seasoning checks, as these have different effects on the grade of a timber.

Quote
That separation that fills with resin, we call a pitch pocket.   It will have handfuls in it, sometimes.

Yep, we call 'em pitch pockets too. Western Larch is particularly notorious for them. Hit a pitch pocket in Larch, and the blade dives instantly (unless you remembered to sock the lube to the blade "just in case").

What I was referring to was shake that fills with pitch after the tree dies. The pitch dries very quickly and shows up as a white line in the wood, often way beyond the visible shake. There's no structural integrety across one of these lines.
Bruce    LT40HDG28 bandsaw
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers."

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