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What can Larch be used for ?

Started by rambo, February 28, 2011, 05:24:31 PM

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snowstorm

verso jay buys it. half the last load i sent was dead. most of it is in waldo county.

Chuck White

Tamarack (Amarican Larch) makes excellent framing material.

It's also good for decking material on farm trailers and hay wagons!

It's a shame to pulp those large Tamarack!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

SwampDonkey

You can see the nice right hand spiral in that but log. ;D

Nice stick, but the first  4 feet seem to taper fast. I've seen lots in the 20's dbh, I don't remember any real tall ones. Usually 68 feet is there limit like a fir. Spruce here are way taller.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

lumberjack48

How many sticks was that beast

It was like a big Apple Jack, 4" limbs, only 6 sticks, about 60' tall, 30+ piece maker sticks. I was running a XL12, Homelite.

I cut that back in 66, there used to be a big demand for Tamarack pulp, i worked for a guy who wanted 16's out of anything 12" and up, he was sawing them for some bridge Co.
One thing about a tamarack board, you can't pull a nail out of it.
Third generation logger, owner operator, 30 yrs felling experience with pole skidder. I got my neck broke back in 89, left me a quad. The wife kept the job going up to 96.

SwampDonkey

I met a man one time about 5 years ago whose son bought a mill and dear old dad was left with the bill. Across the road from the house was a small field and behind it was a stand of tamarack about 50 feet tall. I suggested that, that mill would look nice sitting in a saw shed of some kind instead of out in the elements and rain/snow on it for months on end. That tamarack could make a nice saw shed. It never took, and the twist that came over his nose reminded me of a guy than just took a whiff of skunk scent. :D :D :D

He was selling his land and retiring and was done with the work scene. I was there doing an inventory for an interested client. No sign of the son, and I could tell old dad was holding back a good story. ;)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Maine372

theres videos of that big one coming down on youtube. that tree farmer was earning its keep that day!

Coon

We took some nice 18" dbh tammarack out a few years ago and sawed it up into what we called bull rails for a buffalo farmer.  He had problems with his big bulls snapping posts and boards off on his corrals and runways that he used for shipping his animals.   What we did was just live saw them into 3" thick flitches.  Some of em banana peeled on us from the tension and the farmer told us not to worry he could and would still use them.  When we delivered the last hay wagon load to him we saw quite the scene.  He had old railway ties that they had split in half lengthwise cemeted into the ground about eight feet apart. Him and his two hired guys used two tractors that each had front end loaders on them with big tow straps hanging down to be used as big slings.  They proceeded to weave the flitches into the the tops of the posts by pushing and pulling with the tractors.  :D  Once they got the weave started they would each go to an end of the flitch and push the flitches down till they touched the previous one then drilled and lag bolted them to the post.   They pushed and pulled back and forth so many times that the posts cement and all loosened in the ground.   :D  Needless to say they ended up ordering a bunch of large diameter round tammarack rails to use on the outsides for angle braces.   :D  I remember  Orval (the farmer) saying  "Big Ol' Pithed Off Pete ain't gonna know what hit him this time."  :D  :D   Pithed Off Pete as he called him was quite the bull.  You could walk in the pasture and he would come and sniff you and let you scratch his head any day of the week, but boy oh boy if he saw you come into the pasture with the chore truck you had better have your seatbelt on.  :D  Believe me that was the roughest ride I ever had.  :D   Never again.  The only other time Pete would get disgruntled, to say the least, was if he was locked in the corrals.  

Brad.
Norwood Lumbermate 2000 w/Kohler,
Husqvarna, Stihl and, Jonsereds Saws

Clark

At least one place sells it as flooring:

http://www.tamarackflooring.com/Home.asp

SD - Your heights are interesting, granted we don't tend to get much over 70' either but on those "better" wet sites (I'm still trying to figure out why one wet site is better than the next, they all seem the same to me) they'll reach 80 or 90'.  I'm sure on the high ground we could grow one to 100' but I don't think we've had the time to do that.

Clark
SAF Certified Forester

SwampDonkey

Clark, I'm sure there is a few taller. One time I was really surprised by the growth of red spruce on a site. It wasn't so much the girth, they were 22-26" dbh, but the height. I measured one 2 or 3 times and still didn't believe it. It was 102 feet tall, growing an a wet flood plain. All the mature fir were dead, every one and none of those fir were bigger than 14" inches and way shorter than the spruce.




You can see the distant spruce I was measuring and the dead fir snags leaning and bark curling off.

Just up the bank to the road, the soil changes to glacial-fluvial sand with black spruce mixed with red pine, they might have been 40 feet tall. And the pine might be 8-10".



See a broke off fir at about 4 feet high to the left. There were also white cedar in this stand.

An another site in hardwood and dry shale soil the red spruce were maybe 75 feet tall, but 26-34" dbh.



"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

barbender

 I pulled the mill out today, first time in months! I still had a tamarack bolt sitting on the deck, so I sawed it up and grabbed my camera. (It was almost as if I was waiting for someone to ask what tamarack looked like sawn ;D)



Too many irons in the fire

barbender

As you can see from the black ends, my tamarack has been sitting for quite some time ::)
Too many irons in the fire

SwampDonkey

"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

pbunyan

Here in the U.P. of mich they used mine iron under ground.[now they open pit mine].They used to split tammerack into what they called lagings.These pieces to fill the gaps between the timbers.I never heard of any other spiecies used for this

oscar not the grouch

Hello out there,
I just read with interest all the replies on this subject and was glad to come across Chuck White's reply on March 2nd where he writes "Tamarack makes excellent framing material"
You see, I cut tamarack trees (some white spruce) and had it milled this past November in framing lumber (2x6s, 2x8s, 5x5s, 6x6s and 1 inch thick boards of various lenght and width). I live in Eastern Canada (New Brunswick) and right now we have lots of snow on the ground. My piles are all stickered, covered with lumber tarp and under approx 3 feet of snow. I plan to start building a camp in the Spring......once the 5 feet of snow has melted.. ha! ha!. I will use the 2x6s as studs for the walls and the 2x8s as joists for the floor and loft and some of the boards for flooring.

Therefore, I would very much welcome any other positive feedback like Chuck White's on the use of tamarack as framing lumber. Like I said, I plan to start as early as I can this Spring, nail it down and brace it so not to give it a chance to twist and warp under the hot sun of July and August.

All comments,suggestions welcome.
Tks All,
Oscar

talldog

Oscar,
I have used a little Larch in Maine for various projects.I'm always experimenting with different species.Framing for a woodshed or barn seems to be no problem.However,floor joists in a basement where some heat can get to them from woodstove or boiler isnt so good.They like to cup,check and twist.Sometimes it is hard to drive spikes through.Its still better than going downtown and paying for wood.Good luck on your camp.Dont think about how many blackflies will be hatching from all the snow melt.

oldaxman

I used larch for siding on my sawmill, nailed it up green. Had it up several years now, its ageing nice, no problems with cupping or twisting, never put any finish on it, I'm very happy with it actually.

1270d

those boards look very nice barbender.   Does anyone have any pics of this as finished flooring?

SwampDonkey

One of our members from the UK saws and installs larch flooring. One of his install jobs.  :)

"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

1270d

that is some beutiful stuff.   I love the coloring.  All the tamarak that I cut gets shipped for pulp, and i don't think it would be too difficult to get some of the nice large butt logs to saw up.

Ken

My mom has tamarack down in her horse stable for the floor and it is holding up really well.  Been down for 6 or 7 years now and still in good shape.  I also had a client whose entire house was built from wood off his property.  He had a couple of rooms done with tamarack flooring.  It was some of the prettiest flooring I have ever seen.  He did say though that it was a bit soft.  If someone was to walk on it with high heeled shoes it would show.   Although we don't have a lot of tamarack around here there are some nice stands on abandoned fields.   It also grows very fast given the right soil conditions.  Fun stuff to cut in the winter as the limbs break off when skidding. 
Lots of toys for working in the bush

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