Hardest Wood to Split

[ABtrees]

1 hour ago, sime42 said:

Interesting. So I wasn't quite right, they were using wood for gears at the same time as iron. It was more for quietness and easy of replacement.
It shows how hard the wood is anyway if it was rubbing against iron.

 

There was apparently another reason for using wooden (hornbeam) teeth in the gears.  It was a major safety (and cost saving) feature.  If for some reason (say a large stone) the mill got jammed, with all that power, cast on cast wouldn't have a good outcome - there is no clutch !!!  Alternatively replacing a few wooden teeth you'd be operational again within the hour.  I attach a photo showing it was usually the big (drive) gears that had the wooden teeth.  The smaller gears are iron.

 

BTW the pillars are (apparently) sweet chestnut - no idea why - probably something to do with load bearing ???

 

Edited October 25, 2018 by ABtrees

[se7enthdevil]

the main reason i thought for timbers like hornbeam (and other hard woods) was for the wear factor.

 

hornbeam is well known to have excellent properties against resisting wear and so wearing out too quickly and i expect a few others like apple, whitebeam and hawthorn are probably quite good too.

[se7enthdevil]

13 hours ago, lewiswood said:

 

Playing skittles many people try and tell me that the pins are made of apple wood. Even whenI’ve told them I cut sycamore timber for skittles they don’t believe me.

 

apple wood was used up to a point but my research shows that this was only true mostly during the 30's as the west country got rid of huge amounts of orchards during this time and i guess there was a glut of timber just waiting to be used. historically sycamore and beech were used as they are easy to dry in larger sections and bloody big trees. apple is difficult to season well and usually splits anyway and it's hardly the biggest tree in the world so you don't get much timber yield from it.

 

tell these non believers that you know of the maker of most of the skittles in the UK and he uses sycamore and beech only.

[Haironyourchest]

Don't know about splitability, but Lignum Vitae is pretty tough stuff, still used for propshaft bearings in modern ships!

[Mark J]

Dry apple is canny hard work.

[Billhook]

Just been out to the shed where I keep the few remains of the workings of the Windmill, which has been on this site since the late thirteenth century.  A brick tower mill replaced the old post mill in 1812.  The brick tower still remains but the metal work was removed in the 1950s and these last pieces were left out in the weather for a few decades,

However there is still some wood left in the gear cage, not identified, and some in the metalwork in the other picture.

I think that piece fitted on top of the drive shaft and somehow sat inside the gear cage or perhaps one of you experts can tell me where it was used

It does say a lot about the longevity of the wood to still be there after so long in the weather

[se7enthdevil]

10 hours ago, Haironyourchest said:

Don't know about splitability, but Lignum Vitae is pretty tough stuff, still used for propshaft bearings in modern ships!

i would have said lignum but i was sticking to stuff you actually see on the british isles.

 

[sime42]

Don't know about splitability, but Lignum Vitae is pretty tough stuff, still used for propshaft bearings in modern ships!

I didn't know that. That's surprising. I knew they made lawn bowls from it but just read that it was also used for other sporting stuff like cricket balls and croquet mallets.

[sime42]

the main reason i thought for timbers like hornbeam (and other hard woods) was for the wear factor.
 
hornbeam is well known to have excellent properties against resisting wear and so wearing out too quickly and i expect a few others like apple, whitebeam and hawthorn are probably quite good too.

Yeah, good point. I think resistance to wear is not exactly the same as strength in terms of material properties.

[Woodworks]

36 minutes ago, sime42 said:

11 hours ago, Haironyourchest said:

Don't know about splitability, but Lignum Vitae is pretty tough stuff, still used for propshaft bearings in modern ships!

I didn't know that. That's surprising. I knew they made lawn bowls from it but just read that it was also used for other sporting stuff like cricket balls and croquet mallets.

It's self lubricating in water hence being perfect for the job. Used a few bits around the workshop over the years for it's hard waring properties. The wood I got came from the dockyard.