What wood is this?

[mailee]

A friend of mine has asked me to build a set of wardrobes and a chest to match these:


They are family heirlooms and were a gift from a member of the Vanderbilt family of the USA to my friends sister who was his house
keeper for many years. They were made in the eighties out of reclaimed wood from the furniture on Ellis Island. My question is can anyone tell me what wood this is? Here is a closeup of the drawer in it's natural wood state.

I know the stain is a walnut but would like to match the grain as close as possible.

[mrgrimsdale]

First feeling was "kinell how the f should I know" second was canary whitewood, or cherry?
What is it BTW? Those grilles - is it a ferret coop or some sort of reliquary?

cheers
Jacob

[mailee]

To tell the truth Jason I am not sure what they are. They were part of a container of furniture that was given to my friends sister. They did come with certificates stating who had made them and where the wood was from but he is still looking for those.

[jfc]

I'm Jason , he's Jacob ;D

[mailee]

Oops, sorry It is early for me. ;D Here are a couple of close up shots of the wood used. the drawer sides are made from the tight grained wood here:

And the back of the drawer front is the main wood of the cabinet:

Sorry they are not very good shots but the light wasn't good.

[Roger]

I'd go for Cherry on that one - and he wants Wardrobes to match those ??

[tusses]

looks similar to some old wardrobs I was trying to ID the wood from.

Pirana pine was a popular answer.

Canary whitewood, sickamoor , poplar were others

[engineerone]

not being an expert in photo definition of woods, might i offer a couple of thoughts??

the vanderbilts made their money originally from railways, so it might be a wood that was used in the construction of either carriages or even sleepers in the early days. it looks quite old growth, but wonder whether indeed it might be a kind of eastern pine, which would of course be more stable than pirana pine.

other thoughts are butter nut or indeed cherry, although it has not reddened as much as you would expect.

paul

[modernist]

Oct 18, 2008 11:34:21 GMT engineerone said:

the vanderbilts made their money originally from railways

How on earth do you know these things? :

Brian

[jfc]

How on earth do you know these things?

He's really really old ;D

[modernist]

Just checlked my copy of "The Woodwork Book" timber samples and the drawer sides could be "coachwood" whcih I don't know but chimes with Pauls comment.

the fronts could be canary whitewood

Brian

[engineerone]

brian,
jason is right i really am that old

however, as a youngster (that long ago, but not as long as the original vanderbilts ) i read a lot, when working i travelled so i read, and then i was interested in a number of things
railways, motor car and bike racing, history, and of course the great god money. strangely all are kind of tied up together.

because i spent a lot of time travelling between london and lincolnshire, i got to love railways, particularly the ex gnr, and studied it really well, then i discovered other railway items. for a while it was soccer, wolves in the great days billy wright and all that ;D later i got into motor bike racing and travelled to brands hatch a lot as a lad and then racing cars. somewhere along the way i researched a whole range of things, like how car racing evolved, and the same for other things. got interested in duesenberg cars, and researched the whole american car industry alongside being interested in the evolution of railways outside the uk. many may not know that often it was british contractors who built railways in the us and canada.

in amongst all that whilst i learnt engineering, i also was interested in the financial roots of these things, and in particular boom and bust.

thus i know about jay gould, and jp morgan, and the vanderbilts as well as rockefeller and standard oil, let alone certain parts of american trust laws

it would appear that i am unfortunate enough to have a brain which retains vast amounts of often useless information.

mind you i have enjoyed it all ;D

now then brian maybe you can help me, do you have any experience with bending thin sheet metal?

paul

[tusses]

Oct 18, 2008 21:52:49 GMT engineerone said:

got interested in duesenberg cars,


.......



now then brian maybe you can help me, do you have any experience with bending thin sheet metal?

paul

hence the American phrase ... 'it's a Duesie aint it ' ! meaning worth a lot (i.e like a Rolls Royce)

as for bending metal ... what do you want to know ?

[engineerone]

actually it's a duesie comes more from the advertising they had, and also the fact that they were great racing cars. one being the first american car to win a european grand prix in france in 1921.

whilst we in england tended to refer to rolls royce engineering, duesenberg was often better engineered, whilst of course rolls borrowed their braking system in the 20's from hispano suiza.

anyway, mate i am designing and producing model kits in etched metal. as a result of some of our experiments, we think that earlier estimates we made about metal movement are incorrect, so i wondered whether there were any formulas particularly for thinner metal. all my engineering books are much too old (like me )

i am using 0.010 and 0.015 nickel, and bend it sometimes only at one end through 90 degrees, but other times we z bend it at the same angle but up and down, the bend happens around an etched line. so the question is how much do you need to allow for the bend in the overall length of the metal?? i think and expect it to be between 0.4 and 0.6 of the thickness.

when i produce circles, i use the mean metal thickness for the flattened product, but have in the past tended to just measure to length on the straight metal.

paul

[tusses]

sorry - no 'theory' from me when it gets that thin. I used to draw brackets (a long time ago) but they were generaly 3mm !

the real thin stuff - talk to the people who etch your sheets.

I worked producing photo etch artwork for a while , just converting customer files to acetate. But we used a place called Photo Etch. They are in the birmingham area and I'm sure they are still around. They were quite knowledgeable and had contacts with other customers who might be able to help. Most of the stuff was for model trains, but some was for marconi and the likes for microwave frequency shielding etc so the tolerances were tight !.

The other thing to bare in mind are the etching tolerances , if its over / under etched slightly the depth width and angle of the etch will vary, and give you different bend qualities. As will the thickness of the line on the artwork mask (not the line thickness in your cad file ! ). The photo plotter will alter the line thickness to suit the etch process, so if you switched to brass for instance, you may need new artwork made up.

Try a test sheet - with different thicknesses in bend lines. Then measure the end result. I think trying to go on theory and calculations for stuff this thin will need to be mixed with practical tests and cooperation with your etch company and artwork producer.

[engineerone]

thanks for that tusses, it kind of fixes with my thoughts, but if you don't ask, you don't find out

have used photo etch before too.

paul

[tusses]

As a side note - last time I was in the Haynes motor museum, they had a couple of Duesies

its Down in Yoeville or somewhere OTTOMH, we had a VW weekend there.

[modernist]

Oct 18, 2008 21:52:49 GMT engineerone said:

brian,
jason is right i really am that old

however, as a youngster (that long ago, but not as long as the original vanderbilts ) i read a lot, when working i travelled so i read, and then i was interested in a number of things
railways, motor car and bike racing, history, and of course the great god money. strangely all are kind of tied up together.

because i spent a lot of time travelling between london and lincolnshire, i got to love railways, particularly the ex gnr, and studied it really well, then i discovered other railway items. for a while it was soccer, wolves in the great days billy wright and all that ;D later i got into motor bike racing and travelled to brands hatch a lot as a lad and then racing cars. somewhere along the way i researched a whole range of things, like how car racing evolved, and the same for other things. got interested in duesenberg cars, and researched the whole american car industry alongside being interested in the evolution of railways outside the uk. many may not know that often it was british contractors who built railways in the us and canada.

in amongst all that whilst i learnt engineering, i also was interested in the financial roots of these things, and in particular boom and bust.

thus i know about jay gould, and jp morgan, and the vanderbilts as well as rockefeller and standard oil, let alone certain parts of american trust laws

it would appear that i am unfortunate enough to have a brain which retains vast amounts of often useless information.

mind you i have enjoyed it all ;D

now then brian maybe you can help me, do you have any experience with bending thin sheet metal?

paul

Interesting stuff - personally my brain feel full so I need a Desktop, laptop and PDA just to get from one week to the next.

Can't help yoo on the nbending I'm afraid - I thought it was about 1/3.

We do have a few more things in common as I was also in to motor racing for a while in the 70's. When I was chucked out of an student apprenticeship with RR when they went bust I started working for race engine builders of which there are a few in Derbyshire.

Apart from F5000 Chevvy engines which were "cooking" but tuned to death I did get my hands on some Cosworth F1 and F2 engines and the highlight was a 8 litre Can Am engine from a McLaren which twisted the shaft off the dyno at 850HP. You could get your fist down each intake trumpet.

Later I rebuilt a Maserati Tipo 61 "birdcage" from a pile of bits in tea chests bought in the states by Antony Bamford of JCB fame. The cylinder head had no gasket but was lapped on and the Colloti gearbox/diff was in the rear with and engine speed propshaft.

When I got married I had to get a proper job and couldn't work for love rather than cash any more nor every night, weekend and bank holiday.

Having spent all my life trying to be and engineer I am afraid my knowledge of history is pitiful, the only bit which aroused any interest was the industrial revolution. That is why I like living in the Derwent valley which, contrary to popular belief is the birthplace of the industrial revolution, rathrer than Ironbridge, and quite a lot of it is still there to be seen, including the railways. I live above the original Stevensons plateway built to carry lime to the newly discovered iron ore and coal deposits in Chesterfield.

I'm just digging out my old engineering manuals as I have just bought a tool and cutter grinder for my new metal working shop having inherited an ML7 and Mill drill recently and have about 50 end mills to re-grind. Maybe I should start a new business.

Anyway - no-one has commented on my suggestion of "Coachwood" whatever that is.

Cheers

Brian

[engineerone]

don't know about coachwood, but it could be something like ash.
however, not sure the americans have ash, but they must surely have found woods like it out there, since they had many fine coachbuilders.

paul

[tusses]

modernist said:

which aroused any interest was the industrial revolution. That is why I like living in the Derwent valley which, contrary to popular belief is the birthplace of the industrial revolution, rathrer than Ironbridge, and quite a lot of it is still there to be seen, including the railways. I live above the original Stevensons plateway built to carry lime to the newly discovered iron ore and coal deposits in Chesterfield.

I'm just digging out my old engineering manuals as I have just bought a tool and cutter grinder for my new metal working shop having inherited an ML7 and Mill drill recently and have about 50 end mills to re-grind. Maybe I should start a new business.

Anyway - no-one has commented on my suggestion of "Coachwood" whatever that is.

Cheers

Brian

Boo .... to the industrial revolution !!!

wel the train part anyhow

I live on the canal network which was laid dormant by the rail network !

different nowadays as it's a leisure industry .. but still

I feel I was borne a hundred years too late LOL


oh - and my main interest is cars - VW / classic / and drag racing

[engineerone]

interesting that the canals were often bought by railways to reduce competition, but of course the real problem after about 1840 was the restriction on where you could go by canal

what really killed the canal was the lack of speed, and the small cargoes they could carry on each barge. plus of course the crew was quite big.

we are of course now paying the price for too much choice in personal transport, so the roads are too crowded and some weekends in the summer so are many canals.

still vw's and canals stranger choices than mine ;D

paul

[tusses]

Oct 19, 2008 19:35:34 GMT engineerone said:

still vw's and canals stranger choices than mine ;D

paul

LOL

;D

[jfc]

oh - and my main interest is cars - VW / classic / and drag racing

How do you run in those heels ;D

[tusses]

ooh dearie .... it just takes practice !!! ... dont worry , you'll get used to it ;D