9' Lombard Bites the Dust!!

[Al Smith]

Well there is a special use for about any wood .Bass wood was used on musical instruments too .Okay for that but makes a lousey barrel .Then again white oak would make a lousey fiddle .

 

[Mick!]

Rubbish...? Sometimes considered a utility hardwood like a number of others, you can also find parts of some historical acoustic guitars made from Lombardy Poplar, it has good sound qualities. Said to be like Alder in that regard, but sustains sound better. Still today some brands, like Jackson guitars (Randy Rhoads, Dave Mustaine) considered a good to great make, will sometimes use Lombardy for their solid bodies. Some of the Fender Strats had Lombardy bodies, sometimes called Black Poplar, the 'Italica' being a cultivar. Fiddles and jazz guitars are sometimes made from the species. Much has been used for furniture and architectural purposes. Not generally considered a very attractive wood, it often gets stained or painted. Some carvers like it. The wood has it's uses.

Try selling it, see if you can convince people of its worth.

 

[Al Smith]

They probabley won't pay much but with this so called retail stuff called "white wood " they most likely will carve something out of it .

Which brings up the bunch of pine trim I have sitting on saw horses I just stained and varnished in my living room .Some of it came from the US,some from Canada and some from Chile of all places .Good grief !

 

[Mick!]

They probabley won't pay much but with this so called retail stuff called "white wood " they most likely will carve something out of it .

Which brings up the bunch of pine trim I have sitting on saw horses I just stained and varnished in my living room .Some of it came from the US,some from Canada and some from Chile of all places .Good grief !

I have tonnes and tonnes of poplar and various softwoods in a big pile in my yard. It ain't worth tuppence.
But if any carvers or musical instrument manufacturers care to root around.......

 

[Al Smith]

Well I have probabley 3000-5000 board foot of marginal dead ash logs I only expect to cut out 50 percent if that .I certainly can't sell it but I'd bet somebody on the left coast would be tickled pink with it .Depends on where you're at I suppose .Black walnut isn't a big deal here .On the coast from what they say they think it's gold .

 

[Mick!]

Ash, if your talking about Fraxinus is good firewood, no argument there.

 

[Al Smith]

You know I'm thinking Roger B had a blurb a few years back of a big giant west coast poplar that cowboy Dave was involved in and I think they sold the logs .That pot licker was about twice as tall as our big oaks .

 

[Al Smith]

I had to look up fraxinus,not up on the scientic names IE white ash,baseball bat stuff .Baseball bats come from PA .This stuff is green ash I think .Makes a decent lumber ,strong ,straight grained ,can be disguised to look about like oak with the right stain and finish .

 

[Mick!]

Over here Ash is a sought after firewood, can be burnt green, milling, not so much.
Pop is used here as a good way to use wet ground, clear felled after 20 or so years as paper (I think) or biomass.
You'd go pretty hungry here selling it as firewood. I have heard of people milling it for cheap flooring but I know plenty of mills round here and have yet to see a single stick in any yard.

 

[Al Smith]

I doubt they'd buy it here for firewood either right dead smack in the middle of hardwood country .

I have no idea what they cut for poplar trim .I've heard cottonwood but I really don't know .

 

[Tucker943]

Tulip poplar.

 

[woodworkingboy]

To say that something doesn't sell from your yard or possibly others around, doesn't make it a useless material. It may be useless to you, but an unfair way to dismiss the wood. Part of the business of selling wood, especially logs, is moving it to areas where there is a market. People here at the house sometimes say they have Walnut, but have a hard time finding a buyer. So, Walnut is rubbish? Buyers from all over go to big log auctions to do just that, find wood for their own market. Take Poplar logs back to a local auction where there are architectural millwork companies or instrument makers looking for lumber, and people will be bidding on it. The same applies to Gaboon Ebony, a much sought after and rare material. The wood is extremely hard to work and the dust is close to toxic. Local people may think twice before buying it, but take it to a place where someone is making guitar fretboards, and they will be all over it.

 

[Al Smith]

Well walnut no kidding won't fetch much around here .Maybe if you had a truck load it might .Oak and cherry does pretty good .Again though to get any money you'd need a lot of it .Small timers might buy quantities for about 10-15 cents a BD ft estimated by weight .Firewood brings more but then you have to process it .

Tulip poplar is an imported yard tree .The native poplar is eastern black cotton wood which gets huge .

There you go though ,cotton wood .Not really that strong but makes dandy outrigger pads for bucket trucks etc .Light and doesn't split out like oak, strong enough if it's thick enough .Every thing has a use if you can just figure out what it is .Oh say I think bee keepers use bass wood for super frames ,where the bees build the combs .

 

[Tucker943]

Look at paulownia. We chip it here in PA and send the wood into a dump pile. Overseas that would make people faint.

Al, tulip poplar isn't imported. Its native from Illinois on east, Ive cut BIG pockets of it when logging.

 

[Al Smith]

Well yeah but what I meant is it's not native in these parts .Then again I have blue spruce and it isn't native either .Well maybe in Colorado just not here .

 

[Steve Mack]

I have tonnes and tonnes of poplar and various softwoods in a big pile in my yard. It ain't worth tuppence.
But if any carvers or musical instrument manufacturers care to root around.......

Not worth a cent here. Last big one I did I rang a guy that had asked for some, he sorted through it and took two pieces about 1'x2', not even worth the phone call.

Seems like just about every kind of wood could have a good use. I'm always disappointed at how much good wood goes to waste.

The good timber that gets chipped here every day would make some people cry. Even I'm amazed and I'm a bit immune to it now, and if Jay ever visited Queensland where firewood isn't needed much it'd be harakiri time.

On the other hand, recycled old timber is really sort after and expensive yet they just seem to ignore that the same stuff is still getting cut and wasted every day.

Cost of saving it is too much I guess.

 

[woodworkingboy]

Look at paulowni.

I do pretty regular, quite a commonly used wood in these parts. Interesting wood, soft and spongy but it can be fairly dense. Dry it exposed to the rain or an unsightly gray purple color appears, but very useful, particularly as a cabinet wood. In damp environments it holds out moisture, so Paulownia was the choice for keeping valuable garments. It might have a degree of fire resistance as well. Some specialist cabinet makers will use that material exclusively. Often part of a woman's dowry in past times, the tree being planted when a girl child was born, then harvested when she became engaged, so the story goes. The tree would likely still be pretty young it seems. Domestic supplies have become scarce, mostly out of China now, but generally not as tight grained as the trees here. Never heard of it being imported from the states. Look up 'Kiri chest' on internet images and lots of Paulownia made examples show up.

Steve, somebody must be using Poplar in Australia, it's listed as a timber resource there.

 

[stig]

I used to cut veneer logs from poplar.
A local veneer mill that made beech veneer used poplar to fill out the "holes" when they ran out of cooked beech logs late in the day, before weekend or in the mornings.
Beech has to be boiled/steamed in order to be peeled, poplar doesn't.
Alas, that mill is gone, and so is my market for veneer quality poplar logs. They all get chipped now.