Startin' em early

[7X57chilmau]

Hoosier, Desert Ironwood is one of the hardest woods on earth, not far shy of Lignum Vitae. About 2-3x harder than rock maple.

What you had on your dad's land was probably a species called "Hop Hornbeam". It's commonly called ironwood. Harder than maple, but not as hard as desert ironwood. Makes great tool handles!

In our lives, dozens of irreplaceable opportunities pass us by unnoticed... Only to be lamented as the years whirl past. You don't know what you got till it's gone, eh?

J

 

[7X57chilmau]

We were taught to use the back of the hand to test glassware for heat in laboratory settings back in High School. The added benefit (besides good heat sensitivity) is that the recoil reflex (in case you actually touch the object and it IS hot) pulls the hand away... The other side tends to grab until the brain overrides reflex... Bad Juju.

Oh, and get yer handles on! I wanna see her work!

J

 

[HoosierQ]

7 x 57

You know, we had a lot of the American Hornbeam...the "Muscle Tree". The trunk and branches had a smooth gray bark that looked like it was bulging with muscles underneath.

When you tried to split this wood, it would literally rip lengthwise and big pieces would tear from one side off the other...sometimes leaving deep channels on on side and a wierd sort of hump on the other. I would sometimes have to use an axe to chop the last 1 inch or so even if the splitting ram made it the rest of the way...all this on bone dry dead wood.

The problem was that since these things were mostly dead, we could never find any leaves and the bark was very unremarkable...other than the fact that it peeled right off. It was great firewood, standing upright dry as a bone.

Man the things I could have made from that.

I will look up Hop Hornbeam...Yep...that's it alright. Eastern Hophornbeam. The thing I read said folks called it Ironwood for the obvious reasons.

Thanks a million 7 x57. Believe it or not, the tree was really a big part of my history. We used it more than any other single species of firewood...because of that die off.

Keeping this on topic for THR. American Hophornbeam would be a fantastic wood for knife handles, axe handles, and just about anything else. Would make a terrific club or cane. Maybe even a good gunstock...although it'd be heavy. Apparently this was a popular wood with which to make plane soles...so that's gotta be good. Anybody out there that can access this tree, get your self some up and dry and you'll have a real resource.

 

[7X57chilmau]

Yup, Hop Hornbeam is often called Ironwood. It's great for all the uses you noted.

I've found most very hard woods (anything much harder than dried maple) is easiest worked by rough carving with a band saw, and finishing with a drum or belt sander. They're murder on edged tools, and my hands get awful tired of pushing the blade thru when carving... Monkey with the drum sander's speed to keep from burning the wood. I did my ironwood work on a 2" drum with the drillpress running about 1100rpm, and had minimal burning. The same drum has now done the handle and sheath of my desert ironwood dagger, the kid's serviceberry knife, and the ironwood thumbdagger.... It's still plenty good!

J

 

[grumps]

My brother-in-law from Arkansas sent me a stick with vine twists of hop hornbeam and one of osasge orange for Christmas so I can make a couple canes next year after they dry down. I am looking forward to that. He found them when scouting out game trails for hunting.

 

[JTW Jr.]

my youngest is a blade fanatic.... wonder how that got started