[AT] Spam> RE: Garden tractor???

[charliehill]

Cypress is wonderful stuff.  An even better wood for both rot resistance and 
workability is what we call Juniper down here.  I think it's actually 
American White Cedar or something like that. Most of the old growth Juniper 
and Cypress is about gone down here except deep in the swamps.  When I was a 
kid Juniper was 1st choice for planking wood boats and cypress a closs 
second.  Juniper is a lot lighter.  Neither will rot easily.

Charlie
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Larry Goss" <rlgoss at insightbb.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Monday, January 25, 2010 8:03 PM
Subject: Re: [AT] Spam> RE: Garden tractor???


It's a matter of
control, Charlie. I've seen some gosh-awful results done by people who
didn't have the equipment to do steaming right. The wooden hoops are
built in six sections and have to be bent in circular arcs that are
within a fraction of an inch of being true. If they aren't true, the
54 blades won't fit to make it all bolt together. Each section of the
hoop has a cross-section of 1" X3" and is either 30 or 60 inches long.

It's
a ho-hum job to laminate it, but the idea of having to steam a 1X3
(full-dimension, not planed down) to an exact 60-degree arc and hold it
against "nature" to straighten itself back out is just a bit daunting.

This
time, I'm making it out of cypress, and I'm tempted to leave it
unfinished. The wood professionals at Historic Williamsburg showed me
examples of cypress that have been left unfinished and exposed to the
weather in Virginia for over a century with no rot.

Larry



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