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Silver maple--Comments please

18K views 59 replies 28 participants last post by  bobasaurus 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
I have the opportunity to have two silver maple milled up for about 50 cents a bf.

Trees are about 25-30" breast hgt diam.

For those that work soft maples is it worth the trouble of sawing moving and drying it.

They are yard trees and I have to replace band saw blades at 35 dollars each.

Please if you have first hand experience with doing this sort of thing please comment. The trees are kind of sentimental to me. My wife will calf when she sees me loading into the garage to dry for three years.

Can you make shaker round boxes from silver maple?

I'll at least get some blocks to turn from it.
 
#2 · (Edited by Moderator)
I've yet to hear of anyone boasting that there project was made from Silver Maple or seen it advertised for sale. You could always Google it and see if it is used for anything specific or just gets sent to the landfill . I don't even know if it is a Hard or a Soft Maple to be honest. Possibly jocks Treebones or Barlow can answer your questions .
 
#3 ·
I couldn't say as to making shaker boxes from Silver Maple. I'm pretty sure it's a soft maple and it does spalt very quickly. For that reason alone it can make for an interesting project. Definitely keep some to turn. If you look at my projects you'll see a goblet made from it.
 
#4 ·
I believe that the soft maple I used for flooring at my summer cottage is silver maple. It looks nice , but was not as hard as "hard" maple. (duh) I was happy with the result and at .50 per foot, I'd probably be inclined to use it.
-SST
 
#5 ·
You will not get much usable yield from a tree 25-30 inches in diameter. Silver maple is not as hard as other maple tree species but is a nice wood to turn. You might consider having it quartersawn. Next question is how you plan on drying it. At .50 cents a board foot you can't go wrong. With yard trees not much danger of something like a nail, old fence post or other metal object lurking somewhere inside to destroy a saw blade. I would go for it and get it milled.
 
#6 ·
Silver maple gets a bad rap because it is compared to "hard maple" (sugar maple)...it is not at all soft. Sawn fresh and dried right it makes perfectly good lumber. Go for it ! $.50 a bft for milling and $35 a blade is kinda a gig IMO,shop around unless this sawyer has a VERY good rep.
 
#7 ·
I agree with Daren. .50 a bf is not a bad deal for sawing but I guess I have a real problem with $35 for hitting metal. Being a Woodmizer owner I know that blades from Woodmizer are $25 each and to simply resharpen a blade is $7. Hitting a piece of metal does not make the blade junk. I would also look around for another sawyer. IMHO.
 
#8 · (Edited by Moderator)
Thank you ALL for pausing to write.

DARREN-I really like your site and the economic discussion about wood. I am going to check with a farmer friend about cutting fees.

What constitutes dried right?

Many places on the web have used this wood.

I used to climb these trees, hang bird houses from them and when home on leave slept under them LIKE AN OL' DOG while the sun beat down on me.

I am an old sap(no pun ) when it comes to sentimental things.

thank you also JJ

Nice goblet shim.

My wallet will be prepared for a nail or two. Because I drove them in the tree and then left my father's hammer laying in the yard, I was 8. The bird feeder was made of a 2×8 base, ply wood and had a top and one side. My skills have not progressed much. I sure was proud when those birds used it. The ships carpenter for USS Constitiution could not have been more proud.
 
#9 ·
When I said dried right I was referring to the way maple can "sticker stain" during air drying. Just make sure to use dry stickers and have the pile where it can get good air flow through the stack. A couple nails, while a bummer, are not a deal breaker in a log that size…just get a metal detector and dig them out.
 
#10 ·
I like silver maple for woodturning, & other projects.

I had a tree cut down in my yard & saved some of it.

I cut up some into blocks, & wished I had kept more.

 
#11 ·
It's a "soft" maple, but as someone said, that a relative term. It's more likely to show figure such as curl. It won't be as uniformly white as hard maple - more likely to have subtle color tones - which can be nice looking. I'm guessing that why you don't see much of it as lumber is that it branches out into several "trunks" pretty low to the ground.
 
#12 ·
I sometimes use silver maple instead of poplar on projects. It is much harder and durable and machines very well. It is very stable if dried correctly. It is fairly inexpensive in my area. I have some great curly pieces also that are always set aside for other works. I also don't think you will get much yield from a small diameter tree. You would need to get an estimate as to how much you will realistically yield from these trees.
 
#15 ·
I agree with most that the pricing seems right maybe minus the blade fee.

But I would suggest a bigger issue to me and that is you say the trees are sentimental and for that very reason I would say go for it. If you build anything out of it I think you will enjoy that piece more than you can imagine for that very reason. Every time you go buy the piece you will remember what it was that meant something about those trees.

My parents had a stump (only about 15" diam and 24" long) leftover from a silver maple that had sat for some time I cut it on the bandsaw and it was spalted like you wouldn't believe. I build my mother a nice country box out of it that she had wanted and she loves the fact that it came from that tree that they unfortunately had to cut down.

PS. the rest of it is sitting waiting for the perfect time to be used haha.
 
#16 ·
I measured the trees today and got 32" and 34" using a rachet strap and measing it with a tape 103" and 108" using "Pi' to get diam at chest height.

The 32" does not have a limb for about 14'

What is the average waste factor 25 to 30 %????

Farmer freind said he could mill for about .40 /bf but will have a tough time with trees over 28" diam.

How hard would it be to split these things?

Thank you for all of your help.
 
#17 · (Edited by Moderator)
If he can't mill a 34" log…find another sawyer. Depends how it is sawn as far as waste factor, 1/4 sawn yes it would be 30%+, but there is no real benefit to merit that anyway like oak or sycamore for example. Use that calculator I linked…that is sawn out yield, grade sawn. Just through and through or flitch sawn it is higher (which you cannot do given the size). 32" x 14' is over 650 bft on a bad day on a bandmill.
 
#19 ·
"You will not get much usable yield from a tree 25-30 inches in diameter." ??? At the sawmill I used to work at, most of their grade logs were that size or smaller. Logs bigger than 30" aren't all that plentiful anymore like they once were.

I would not hesitate to saw them. Soft maple was a junk wood years ago, but that has changed, and the price has risen accordingly. Around here it costs about the same per bf as red oak.
 
#21 ·
Silver Maple, commonly called soft Maple which it isn't, soft that is, has probably got more local names than crappie (if you don't fish ask someone that does) in Ky its often called water maple. When I was growing up it was simply maple and sugar maple, often called hard maple. I suspect that most maple furniture (mass production) is soft maple and probably a lot of maple veneer.
 
#22 ·
Began sawing the silver maple today and got +/-200 bf out of the upper trunks

about 18-6w x 10ft
7--12w x 10ft
and a bunch of misc 1"

12-- 3" square x 48" future stool legs.

The farmer is doing the work for a very reasonable lump sum.
I provided the labor.
As a boy I worked for this man on his apple farm. I felt like a kid again today. I know cutting wood day in day out is real work but I had a blast today.

It was nice winter weather today. When the sun went down it got real cold.

Thanks again for all the great advice from you folks.
 
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