Locust tree stock?

[garbler]

100yrs for a locust fence post is not at all out of the ordinary. Ever been up around the Blue Ridge mountains in the fall/winter? Step out in the morning with coffee and sit on the porch and take in that mountain air, the smell of a fireplace or wood burning stove burning locust bark is unmistakable, and sweet smelling, it is THE wood fire smell that lets you know you are in the Blue Ridge..

Reminds me of the old New England Yankee saying that a ‘ Locust post will last two years longer than stone ‘

Rick

[Hannibal]

I’ve worked with black locust in the boat building industry for many years. We called it poor man’s teak as it as rot resistant as any domestic species. The wood is heavy and despite what some may say is not hard to work either with high speed steel knives or cutters or sharp hand tools. Sands well and takes clear and oil finishes as fine as anything.

The biggest problem with harvesting Black Locust is they are quite often hollowed out by ants rendering the log good for light trim, fence posts or the best ‘ all nighters ‘ for your wood stove. Living in NH for years we had lots of locust but also had our share of bummer logs. Hard enough to find a straight butt end without ant damage. BL is hard around 1700 on the Janka scale and weighs around 48-52# per cu ft. It contains quite a bit of gums and resins which don’t leave room for much cellular moisture migration which means good dimensional stability similar to many of the better tropicals. It is also not split prone around fasteners, glues well and doesn’t really require a lot of drying to use since there is not a lot of free moisture in this species.

However it has another characteristic that aids in this department and that is the pores of the wood are capped by a natural bi-product called tyloses which prevents water from traveling into the wood. It’s these features that make it a prized boat building wood along with the addition of natural fluorescence. With clear or oil finishes the wood can actually glow in streaks under certain light conditions. It’s really nice and depending on the use can make up for the lack of spectacular
figure found in Claro, English and Bastogne walnuts. As a boat builder I stayed away from narley highly figured wood but there are logs with decent figure it’s just not as common.

Rick

Thank you for your information. I now am assured this is far from an exercise in futility, it's just a matter of finding the right piece of wood and treating it accordingly. I like challenges and this one suits me just fine.

[Hannibal]

It's been a few years, but I've cut a bunch of both Honey Locust and Black Locust. Some of the Black Locust were 80' or more tall and very straight. Split like a dream and burned hot. Nothing at all interesting about the grain structure or wood color. Reminded me a lot of Red Oak only taller and older.

Honey locust on the other hand. Pretty unusual to find a piece with straight grain and had a lot more color to the wood. Grain structure was twisted and nowhere near uniform. I should have saved some 4' logs back then but at the time I was interested in keeping the house warm so it got split and burned.

I'd never invest the time in making a Black Locust stock. Nothing to see.

A Honey Locust stock....... no one is going to recognise that.

[pworley1]

It would be better suited for pistol grips because of its weight.

[Hannibal]

I'd say a barrel profile influences the weight more than a wood type. If I were worried about that I'd go with a skeleonized or composit.

[barnetmill]

I have a couple of planted honey locust for the seed pods. One is the grafted thornless Calhoun variety and the others are Hersey seedlings that should be relatively thornless.

[GregLaROCHE]

After thinking about this post I wanted to add something. I’m mostly into classic and antique guns and solid wood is the only thing I would want for a stock, however if I was making a stock for a modern rifle, I would consider making a laminated stock. You could use different color woods or all the same. The benefits are that thin wood will season quickly and the laminated stock will be more stable with time and weather conditions. Just something to think about. Good luck.

[TD1886]

Black locust is different from the Honey locust. The Honey locust is the one with the 3-4" thorns. The Black locust has short stubby thorns. Honey locust rots easily while the Black locust does not. Black locust make excellent fence post. Some of the Honey locust do not have thorns, the ones with thorns will cause severe infections if they penetrate your hand or feet very deep, almost like the bamboo punji stakes in Nam. Have cut a bunch of both types. Have never seen a Black locust over 10 - 14" dia, but the Honey locust get 2-3' in dia. This is my experience with the Locust family here in West Tenn.. They are hard on tractor tires. Cut every one I see on my place. Would think the Black locust would make a very classy looking stock but would be dense and heavy, the Honey locust the color would be lighter and not as heavy, but would still be a classy looking stock. Have you ever thought about making one from a Sassafras tree, they were used to make boat keels in the old days.

Had a friend that had a saw mill. He cut some Sassafras into board and then finished them after they had cure. It looks very much like Mahogany.

[TD1886]

We've all burned it locust. Nobody mentioned that it burns hot enough to cause your grates to bend and sag. I was told many years ago not to burn just locust, to mix it wood that doesn't burn so hot. I'm trying to think of this other wood that burns really hot, in face with a blue flame. Red something, Red Bud, Rose Bud???? Come on guys help me out.

[garbler]

Sassafras is another of my favorite species but can be hard to find unless you live where they get large and know somebody with a mill. It’s not a heavily marketed species due to unreliable sources. I got lucky a couple years ago a bought 2K feet in both 5/4 and 6/4” from a guy in South MO who stickered it two years to about 11-12%. I love this stuff as it’s really easy to work, pretty stable, excellent rot resistance and a grain pattern and look that can be mistaken for now gone Chestnut. But stained it is close to green ash or some red oaks but without the flecks. Here in Western lower Michigan they are almost like weeds but we are too far North for them to get big like they do South of here. Not suitable for a gunstock since the wood is too soft and easily dented. The color is more or less yellowish light brown to olive colored but the heart wood is darker and ages even darker yet. Anybody who can find some should grab it and give it a try, it’s not expensive less than third of the price of Honduras mahogany and actually close to good clear pine. But it does have a few large loose knots so you need to layout around them but at the cost it’s a

Rick

[Hannibal]

We've all burned it locust. Nobody mentioned that it burns hot enough to cause your grates to bend and sag. I was told many years ago not to burn just locust, to mix it wood that doesn't burn so hot. I'm trying to think of this other wood that burns really hot, in face with a blue flame. Red something, Red Bud, Rose Bud???? Come on guys help me out.

I don't know about anything that starts with Red but Osage Orange/Bodarc/Hedge burns really hot. Perhaps a bit hotter than Locust even. It burns really good green also which is very handy to know sometimes. It's hell on chains if it's been dead a couple of years though. You'll see sparks occasionally.

I used barrel stoves and just left a thick coat of ashes in the bottom. Once you get a good coal bed going you can just chuck 3 pieces on the top and it'll put out a whole bunch of heat. Probably too much for most houses unless you mix it with other stuff. Great for a shop or garage though.

Seasoned Oak was always my favorite for heating the house. Any variety of Red or White Oak seemed to burn about the same and didn't get so hot It would have you opening windows like Locust or Hedge.

Maybe Red Oak is what you were thinking about?

[TD1886]

I don't know about anything that starts with Red but Osage Orange/Bodarc/Hedge burns really hot. Perhaps a bit hotter than Locust even. It burns really good green also which is very handy to know sometimes. It's hell on chains if it's been dead a couple of years though. You'll see sparks occasionally.

I used barrel stoves and just left a thick coat of ashes in the bottom. Once you get a good coal bed going you can just chuck 3 pieces on the top and it'll put out a whole bunch of heat. Probably too much for most houses unless you mix it with other stuff. Great for a shop or garage though.

I think this is it:

https://www.wood-database.com/eastern-redbud/

[garbler]

Heated two homes and a shop in ME, NH and now MI with Jotul stoves. They always recommend an inch or more of sand in the bottom to protect from high heat. Yes Locust burns hot and long due to resin content so can only imagine hot Osage Orange would burn.

Rick

[Hannibal]

I think this is it:

https://www.wood-database.com/eastern-redbud/

Interesting. Around here RedBud is usually grown as an ornamental tree. They don't get very big, 20' is a big one. They're usually shaped like a big bush. Not much of a trunk and it seems like they always get black carpenter ants in them. Maybe the variety around here is different?

[TD1886]

Interesting. Around here RedBud is usually grown as an ornamental tree. They don't get very big, 20' is a big one. They're usually shaped like a big bush. Not much of a trunk and it seems like they always get black carpenter ants in them. Maybe the variety around here is different?

I think so as these were a tree not shaped like a bush. I'll do more research.

[indian joe]

Black locust is different from the Honey locust. The Honey locust is the one with the 3-4" thorns. The Black locust has short stubby thorns. Honey locust rots easily while the Black locust does not. Black locust make excellent fence post. Some of the Honey locust do not have thorns, the ones with thorns will cause severe infections if they penetrate your hand or feet very deep, almost like the bamboo punji stakes in Nam. Have cut a bunch of both types. Have never seen a Black locust over 10 - 14" dia, but the Honey locust get 2-3' in dia. This is my experience with the Locust family here in West Tenn.. They are hard on tractor tires. Cut every one I see on my place. Would think the Black locust would make a very classy looking stock but would be dense and heavy, the Honey locust the color would be lighter and not as heavy, but would still be a classy looking stock. Have you ever thought about making one from a Sassafras tree, they were used to make boat keels in the old days.

yep thats the one we bought two honey locust sposed to be the thornless type (ha! got conned) seemed like they were male and female trees? one had very few spikes and set no pods - other was loaded with pods every year and spikes 3-4 inch long and sharp! It was a good shade tree till it got about a foot diameter then started dropping little clusters of dried spikes - we hacked it down - suckers came up everywhere - roundup in diesel several times - seeds sprouted new ones to dig out - 5 years on we are about done cleaning it up .

[Hannibal]

yep thats the one we bought two honey locust sposed to be the thornless type (ha! got conned) seemed like they were male and female trees? one had very few spikes and set no pods - other was loaded with pods every year and spikes 3-4 inch long and sharp! It was a good shade tree till it got about a foot diameter then started dropping little clusters of dried spikes - we hacked it down - suckers came up everywhere - roundup in diesel several times - seeds sprouted new ones to dig out - 5 years on we are about done cleaning it up .

It's obviously too late to be of help to you but I've had good luck cutting them down in winter and spraying the stump with Tordon. Like most things it doesn't work every time but it usually does.

[bedbugbilly]

We cut a lot of Locust on the farm fore fence posts - and we bitterly had 10 miles of fence on the farm to keep up when we had cattle.

My question would be how are you drying - air or kiln? Before you get too carried away, you're going to want it ar the right moisture content so it's stable or a lot of hard work will be quickly for naught.

I remember we cut a couple hundred posts one year in the winter and piled them until spring. Soon as spring came, we started in using them to repair some fence lines and put up a new stretch of fence. Once we had them in the ground - about two weeks later we were greeted by many of them "sprouting" new growth! A very strange thing to see!

I sold the remaining acreage of the farm in 2019. At that time, we had a corner post - about 12 inches in diameter that was set in cement. My Dad had put it in in 1936 and had marked the year in the cement - so it's been in for 87 years. It is still rock solid and almost impossible to drive a fence staple in all the way.

Anything is possible if you set your mind to it and the grain pattern would be unique - but a heavy carry in the woods.

I worked with soft and hardwoods my entire life - I was a cabinet maker and finish carpenter an own a custom woodworking/millwork shop. I always enjoyed working with out of the ordinary woods. I built a number of half and full stock muzzleloaders - curly cherry, walnut, curly and straight grain maple and even a full stock out of white ash that had a hard and curly grain - all of them a fun challenge. Years ago, I was down at Friendship for the Nationals and I ran across a fellow from Kentucky who had stock blanks for sale and he had two Persimmon full stock blanks. I had never worked with that species and he explained that it was known as "poor man's Ebony", and it could be stained to match Ebony. The only Ebony I had ever worked with was fiddle pegs, fiddle fingerboards, etc. as I play fiddle and used to restore old fiddles. The Persimmon is light colored and is very dense and straight grained. I bought one of the blanks, took it to my truck and decided to go back and buy the other as well because, to me, it was something I had never run across before. I still have the blanks and, hopefully will use one to build a full stock Southern style flint chunk gun sometime before I leave this world.

I say "go for it" with the Locust and see how it works out! It ought to be an interesting challenge and we'd love to see photos as the project moves along - plus it would be a great heirloom to pass on!

[Mk42gunner]

For you guys wanting to drive nails or fencing staples into old well seasoned locust or hedge, my 84 year old boss showed me the trick when I was 12. Dip the end in grease. Oil may work too, never tried it.

He let me bend a few 20 penny nails trying to nail some 1x6's of well seasoned native lumber to a hedge corner post before he said dip it in some grease. The rest of the nails went in like I was driving them in butter.

He also taught me to measure the depth of a hole before dropping a corner post in. Not a lot of fun pulling a 9 foot corner post out by myself because the hole was a foot too deep.

Robert

[Hannibal]

I must admit that I never tried grease. I just wrapped the wire all the way around wooden line and corner posts.

Many ways to skin a cat.

If it's the wrong cow or bull they'll blow through a fence no matter how tight it is or how many strands, anyway.


Or so I've noted. Just get rid of those critters. Not worth the trouble.