21-07-2011, 06:07 PM
(21-07-2011, 04:23 PM)Brianc Wrote: What an interesting site - also bookmarked!
One thing that struck me is the quality of the wood the guy was using. I wonder whether that is typical of Californian "lumber" or does he have to get it from special sources. Several members of the forum have had a terrible job finding decent plywood in the UK and I wonder if it would be possible to make such a tool with the materials available here!
The 'plywood' you see in DIY stores, and most of the stuff at timber merchants is contruction grade plywood - as Captain Kirk might have said 'it's plywood Jim, but not as we know it'. It's full of voids and the inner plys are wider thqan the thin vener surface, and are low grade softwood. Perfectly adequate for its normal intended use, but certainly not for such htings as furniture. You can get furniture grade plywood in the UK from timber merchants, but you have to ask for 'birch through and through' and of course, it's much dearer.
I've attached a pic of a piece of 'birch through and through' to show what it looks like and I think it's what most of us over 60 consider to be 'real' plywood.
As to softwood, if you look in B&Q you will see 2.4M lengths of nominally 3" x 2" and 4" x 2" planed square edge softwood with the corners softened. Its good quality, quite cheap and you can select it yourself for least knots and shakes. I've used a lot of it to build my workshop, including the pitched roof trusses, and to make benches and even scaffolding to cut a high hedge. It's called 'CLS' which I'm told is a generic term that stands for 'Canadian Lumber Stock'.
David
