Thread: Planing redgum

Hi Gritpipe
Welcome to the forum . I don't know your skill levels but if you are new to planeing and need the timber for a job with a deadline I'd definitely have them machined. Of course I'd be buying the thicky and having some fun learning which is what I did, but I wasn't making something to a deadline or to a finish.

TT

Would look great! ... for a few weeks or months.
After that, the timber will move like CRAZY.
I built a benchtop from beautifully grained VERY old redgum. Carefully planed and thicknessed it, stored it for many months in the building it was going in to normalize the moisture content, planed and thicknessed it a smidgeon more to compensate for the very slight warping that I had expected from the move from shed to house. Then joined them with a double row of buiscuit dowels and glued the whole thing up. It looked stunning after sanding and completely sealing it with two pack polyurethane!
After around 6 months, a couple of joints opened slightly - and kept going. When the gaps got to 10mm wide in the middle of the benchtop, I filled the gaps with epoxy, sanded it all again and resealed the entire benchtop again (all round) with more two pack. Six months after that the first cracks started again - in different joints. One of them opened up to 13mm before I repeated the filling - sanding - sealing. One year later, I gave up. The joints have opened in different places again, some have closed again and several of the 'slats' have twisted near the ends.
Never again!!
All our other benchtops were then made from Jarrah flooring terriffic after 25 years!

Hey TT, thanks for the reply, no rush on this project so hand tools are still an option. Regarding the skill level, I'm a newbie. I'm assuming if I cut the redgum into shorter lengths hand planing might be an option but, I also assume there'll be a bit of physical labour and time involved that'll prevent me from pursuing my other hobbies... Any idea how hard the redgum'll be on the cutters? Cheers

Gritppe

I can actually back some of this up. In my experience red gum can move a lot.

To do this by hand with any kind of efficiency you'll need a few things:

Square
Straight Edge
Adequate Workbench
Appropriate sharpening media for the planes.

After that, you'll need at least one plane, and up to four.

If it was me, I would use a No. 5 plane with a cambered (curved) cutting edge on the blade to knock off the rough sawn and get it close to flat. Then I would either swap with a straight blade or use a different No. 5 plane to get a truly flat surface. Then, depending on the length of the boards, I would use a No. 7 to ensure it was nice and straight, and also to joint one edge.

At this stage, it gets into some true skill (and that's not to say that the previous steps were simple). You'll need a marking gauge (gotta get one of those) registered against the flat edge to define the desired width of the board, and then you'll need to saw off the majority of the waste with a rip saw (something else to buy and sharpen appropriately), and then plane down to the gauge line. This will give you one flat face and two flat, parallel edges that are 90deg to the flat face.

Then, repeat the marking gauge process using the original, flat face and then flatten the opposing face, bringing it down to the gauge line and, finally, in parallel with the other face. At this stage, the board is Dressed All Round and you can carry on with the project, assuming of course the project only requires one board. Otherwise, repeat this step for every board in the project.

And then, since it's Red Gum, after you've dressed the last board, start all over because the first board would have moved some by then.

So... In other words...

Yes, I would seriously consider machining it. Complete dimensioning of rough sawn timber is hard work, particularly if you aren't experienced or already equipped with the appropriate tools, and particularly if it's Red Gum, which is quite hard, heavy, gummy, and blunting. I once did what you're wanting to do on a Red Gum chest build, only I had a table saw and a thicknesser and I still ended up having to abort the project because the wood moved after initial dimensioning.

That's not to be discouraging. You certainly can make great stuff out of Red Gum, but it pays to work efficiently and account for more movement than usual.

Good luck,
Luke

Other people have given their opinion. My experience is contrary to theirs, but I was not making big panels with it.

I made two Georgian style bedside tables with Redgum about ten years ago. They're still perfect.

I'm not saying the other guys didn't have these problems, just that my experience has been the diametric opposite.

That all said, I don't think that Red Gum is the best material for the purpose you have chosen. It would look fabulous but it is awfully hard on hand tools, and after all that work, the next owner of the house is just going to paint it anyway!

I would recommend machining it. Preferably with abrasives for flat surfaces.

G'day All, and thanks for your replies. I'm hearing you pretty clearly that using a plane, while possible, is probably for masochists. About the redgum not being a particularly stable timber, you're right on the money. There are signs of other redgum parts in the building (from a previous owner), moving around and no longer being true. If anyone knows of a good fee for service wood machining shop in southern Adelaide.... Gritpipe out.

redgum is a siliceous timber and your plane will dull extremely quickly.
I did some planing on redgum stumps a while back and I had a few spare blades so I didn't have keep going to my tormek, and I wasn't removing that much material.
So have a look at your pieces and determine how much cupping, twisting and warping there is and decide how much material you'll need to remove.
I'd use either a #4 or #5, basically because I can buy cheap blades. I have 5 of them, so I keep changing blades as soon as they go blunt. You'll have to either have your sharpening station ready to go or get a few spare ones like me. Be patient and take your time because it will take a long time planing by hand but the end result is quite striking.

If I'm reading right, that's janka 2160 and mentioned above to have significant silica content. You can work wood like that by hand, by the territory for the hand dimensioner is usally wood in the 500-1500 janka hardness range.

If I had a lot of that to work and I didn't want large stationary power tools, I'd consider getting a hand power planer with carbide blades to do a lot of the work. The only trouble with that is that hand power planers aren't particularly accurate and working the wood the next step after them with a plane can be problematic.

These parts are for windows and door frames only and not for windows and doors, correct? I would at least get a lunch box planer and let it take the beating if there is a significant volume to be done.

Hmm, my sporadic experience with Red-Gum (and I presume you mean River Red Gum, E. camaldulensis) has been varied. On average, it has been much better than Forest Red Gum (E. tereticornis), but still a reasonably tough customer. One lot (which Luke got from somewhere) was actually quite good to work with and planed fairly easily, with little tear-out despite being moderately figured. Every Eucalypt I've come across is siliceous to a greater or lesser degree and so yes, you will certainly need to stop & sharpen often. The Forest Red Gum we used for Luke's bench was about as nasty a wood to hand plane as I think I've ever encountered. We managed it, but I'd be lying if I said it was fun!

Both red-gums have moderately high shrinkage rates:
RRG: Radial: 5.3%, Tangential: 8.8%.
FRG: 8.6% (tangential); 4.8% (radial).

But their main problem is they take forever to equilibrate, partly because of their density and also because they do seem to be slow 'driers', in my experience, even for our hardwoods. I would have some caution in choosing such woods for window & door frames, they are certainly as durable as it gets, but the potential for movement where exposed to weather might be your undoing. Remember, hard, dense woods develop a lot of power when they absorb moisture, & no amount of restraint will stop them moving if they chose to do so.

For applications where movement isn't an issue, or in situations where it is well-protected from the elements, it should give few problems, as long as the wood has properly equilibrated before you start working it, which can take almost forever if the sections are thick. But a bench I made from well-seasoned Sydney Blue-gum about 25 years ago has remained sound and the glue joints in the top of it are still perfect. It has shrinkage values which are substantially higher than either RRG or FRG!

Cheers,

Hello gritpipe,

I reckon prior to the 1970's most major towns had decent timber yards,
that had a vast variety of timbers for all the different applications of timber.

There are all different characteristics of timber: density, moisture content, flexibility,
strength, shrinkage rate, and the list goes on.

What I'm getting at is, you need to match the right timber to its application to
achieve satisfactory results.

Red gum may be good for rough work, where movement is not a problem,
like slab furniture, post & rail fencing. But not for window or door frames that
need to be stable to have windows and doors with good opening & closing
weather poof fit without any binding.

Hope this is of help to you.

Regards

Graham.

Grahams thoughts on Red Gum match my own.

Stewie;

Presumably this wood isn't available quartered or can't be prepared quartered? Most woods that are very poorly behaved all of the sudden are very tame if sawn properly. Unfortunately, that often means quartered or rift with pith sawn perfectly centered, and that is uncommon these days.

Originally Posted by D.W.

Presumably this wood isn't available quartered or can't be prepared quartered? Most woods that are very poorly behaved all of the sudden are very tame if sawn properly. Unfortunately, that often means quartered or rift with pith sawn perfectly centered, and that is uncommon these days.

David. Joe's experience using Red Gum exemplifies the difficulties in using this timber, regardless of grain configuration.

Would look great! ... for a few weeks or months.
After that, the timber will move like CRAZY.
I built a benchtop from beautifully grained VERY old redgum. Carefully planed and thicknessed it, stored it for many months in the building it was going in to normalize the moisture content, planed and thicknessed it a smidgon more to compensate for the very slight warping that I had expected from the move from shed to house. Then joined them with a double row of dowel plates (lamellos) and glued the whole thing up. It looked stunning after sanding and completely sealing it with two pack polyurethane!
After around 6 months, a couple of joints opened slightly - and kept going. When the gaps got to 10mm wide in the middle of the benchtop, I filled the gaps with epoxy, sanded it all again and resealed the entire benchtop again (all round) with more two pack. Six months after that the first cracks started again - in different joints. One of them opened up to 13mm before I repeated the filling - sanding - sealing. One year later, I gave up. The joints have opened in different places again, some have closed again and several of the 'slats' have twisted near the ends.
Never again!!
All our other benchtops were then made from Jarrah flooring terriffic after 25 years!

Cheers,
Joe

Ladies and Gents,

Thank you all for your knowledgeable replies. As an amateur woodworker there's a lot that I hadn't taken into account. Will stick with indoor applications for this wood and get it machined.