Baking a piece of wood (what?)

[NickfromWI]

Yep. I greatly underestimated how much moisture was still in that wood. I like the steaming idea.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

Drying wood is an area I know a great deal about right now. (I'm just about to spend $750,000 on a dryer) - I know this, that the phenols and turps will start to boil off the closer you get to 100C. this is why all commercial kilns and pellet plant dryers work at under 90C, usually about 75C. Mine will be drying woodchips at 45C.

 

[Marc-Antoine]

The freeze trick is good for killing almost all the active living organisms (not all), but it can do nothing for many of them when they are in the resistance form, like seeds, eggs, mold spores...
It's mainly a story of water content. When the water freeze, the ice crystals grow up as acute needles and shred the cell's structures. If the cell has a low enough level of water, the damages stay low or extremely low and the life goes on after warming and watering.
Eventually, active living organisms can survive the deep freezing. Some ants are concerned, or as you see that all the time in winter, a great number of plants, either grass or trees.
The main point is to give enough time for the water to get out of the cells (slow freezing). The ice crystals grows up too, but outside the cell. During this, the cell loose her water, concentrate, shrink and remain unfrozen far away in the low temp. When it ends to freeze as well, the inside ice crystals are too tinny to wreck the cells. It's this exact process in the leafs, buds, twiggs ... The cell walls are full of ice, the leafs look like glass, the wood seems deeply frozen, but the cells are still alive.
In some case, you can make an organism (very small) survives, by a very very quick cooling process (and a so quicker warming). The cells freeze completely, but with a great number of tinny ice crystals. So the damages are sustainable and could be repaired.
Wonderful life.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Interesting!

 

[stig]

I told you it would crack!

Actually as the moisture normalises, some of the cracks will disappear.

As for treatment, a mixture of linseed oil and wood tar would be a fine choice.

It has kept the Norwegian stave churches sound for close to a millenium.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

I've painted that mixture on barns in Southern Sweden. I keep meaning to make some myself here.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

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[stig]

All my wooden outbuildings have been painted with that. I add some carbon black and they only need a repaint every 10 years.
Great stuff.

 

[okietreedude]

making that tar was cool.. do you have to use the stump or can you use a log, dry or green and does specie matter? we cut down pines around here and it would be cool to make some tar at a Boy Scout event just to show it. any further info wood be appreciated.

 

[Al Smith]

Depending on the application I'll tell you what will work,sevin dust .

I had about a million ants get in some green cut hickory a few years back so I applied the stuff through one of those water gizmos you put on a garden hose .Within two days about a million ants grave yard dead .

 

[Al Smith]

Another thing . Rather than use heat small amounts of wood ,lumber whatever can be dehumidified by using a household sized dehumidifier .Encase it with plastic and take a suction on it until it's dried out .A lot of times things like gypsy moths vacate once the wood is dry .

Most times air dried lumber can get to around 20 percent moisture but to get to what they call "stabalized" it should be taken to around 12 percent if I'm not mistaken .

 

[Marc-Antoine]

Could you tell the recipe for your mixture of linseed oil and wood tar?
I have in project a timber frame garage and a small shed for fire wood. I'm looking for a good long lasting preservative against rot and borers.

I suppose there's a limited choice of colors?

 

[woodworkingboy]

There are some good exterior sealant products put out in Germany. Colors, yes. Borers.....I dunno.

 

[Al Smith]

Well believe it or not in certain areas they used to "paint" the buildings with crude oil right out of the well .Of course you first need an oil well .

 

[woodworkingboy]

Based on what I see in the Pine logs here, it seems that you could make the tar out of them, not just the stump. Perhaps a lesser amount of tar per volume of wood, compared to the stump wood alone. Does the Pine tar actually dry and loose it's stickiness? Does hot weather make it sticky again like untreated pitch?

 

[Thor's Hammer]

Mixing it with linseed 50:50 makes it soak into the wood very well. The wood certainly is'nt sticky afterward, I imagine thats why its always done on a hot summer day, so the wood to be treated is 'thirsty' for the treatment, and soaks it right up.

I've even used a bit of gloss paint in it before now, to deepen the reddish colour. As for log vs root, there is such a high pitch content in the roots, it saves repeating the process. Afterward though, you can use the material as charcoal for your barbecue.

 

[Al Smith]

Back in the days of lead paint the mixture used a linseed oil base .On old barns it was cheaper to first use plain linseed oil to primer the old barn then go over them with the paint which took a month of Sundays to stir up .Lawdy a 5 gallon bucket of the stuff would have 6 inchs of the gooey pigment and white lead compound in the bottom .

Those old barns would soak up paint like a sponge but the old lead paint was good for about 20 years .

 

[woodworkingboy]

Working in and visiting the old school woodwork shops in Great Britain, particularly in Bucks, the smell in those places was a combination of wood, hide glue, and linseed oil. Cheese toast was a lesser element. Not a bad smell.

 

[Al Smith]

Ha hide glue,haven't seen or smelled the stuff in years .Oak on the other hand smells the same if it's 200 years old or green sawn .Damned stuff makes my eyes water .

 

[Al Smith]

You know on this oil and paint business it became cheaper in the long haul to metal side those old buildings .The danged paint became so it was only good for about 5 to 7years .After about two or three times of repainting you had the price of the siding invested .

 

[Thor's Hammer]

Not if you used wood tar and linseed oil Al. If seen buildings hundreds and hundreds of years old with such treatment. I'm yet to see steel sidings look good beyond 10 years.

 

[stig]

Precisely.
Good carpentry work, that allows the water to drip off the wood fast and linseed/tar mixture will make a wooden building last a looooong time.

Marc, you can add any natural pigment to change the color, but it'll alwys be in the dark end of things, since the tar is dark.
But if you ever go to Sweden or Finland, you can find very light types of tar.

 

[Al Smith]

Well yeah I can agree about all that .However it depends on the praticular situation .A fine old heritage home is one thing and a dairy barn is another .FWIW those old out buildings I mentioned with crude oil lasted for years and years if they got treated on a regular bassis .

As far as metal siding it will hang in there too .Just depends on what you want .

 

[Al Smith]

I just thought of something that most will find dumb but here goes .

Years ago the farmers up around Cadillac Michigan would side their barns and outbuildings with pine I assume,board and batten .They wouldn't paint them at all .No oil no tar nothing .

Because the way the property tax was figured they would reside them every 20 to 25 years because what they saved in taxes more than paid for the siding .They kept good roofs on them though .Odd but that's just the way they did it back then .

 

[Thor's Hammer]

No difference between crude oil and wood tar. Its the same idea, an oil based treatment that soaks into the wood. My experience of steel siding, even the expensive galvanised plastic coated stuff, is that it slowly rusts after a couple of years, and ends up looking really ugly.
Downside of using wood tar is that it's really flammable. I do wonder if you could add a fireproofing agent of some kind.