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What Are These Lines In My Bracewood ?
http://w-ww.luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=15370		 Page 1 of 2
Author:  Richard_N [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 6:56 am ]
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Hi

I've just been planing my braces to thickness and about half of them have what can be best described as "wiggly lines " running at an angle across the sides.

You can just about see them in this photo:





They are quarter sawn Sitka Spruce and the lines were not initialy visible when I sawed the blanks just when I planed them down to thickness. They don't seem to be lines left by bad planing since they seem to run right thru the braces (you can see them in the ends of the brace).

Can anyone tell me what this is please?

Are they ok to use ?

Thanks in advance

Richard

Author:  Jody [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 7:03 am ]
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 looks like your medulary rays to me  .. better go see a doc !  LOL
Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 7:11 am ]
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It is where the grain is running out. Personally that is a lot of run-out. When looking at the end of the brace plank is the lines of the grain good and vertical and consistently so?

From what I see I would expect the grain to be pitched toward the edge of the brace plank that is clamped.

I had much rather see the run-out lines on the sides of the brace be much more concentric about the center of the brace like this sketch

Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 7:24 am ]
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here are two more sketches looking at the top or bottom of a brace plank. The top one shows the grain with no run-out

The bottom one is with the grain running out to the sides of the brace plank or not in line with the geometry of the plank

Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 7:39 am ]
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One more thing: If the grain when viewed from the ends of the plank are nice and vertical then I would not expect to see many grain exit points on the sides. (the lines on the side)

None the less if the grain is nice and vertical when viewed from the ends I would not necessarily reject this brace. but if the gran is running out in two axis I would have concern.
Author:  Richard_N [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 8:17 am ]
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Thanks for the replies.

Michael,

As far as I can remember ( I don't have the wood in front of me at the moment) The lines don't look like grain lines , they look like a different density of wood.

The grain at the end of the brace blank is nearly perfectly vertical and where these other lines meet the end if the blank you can also see they cross the blank perpendicular to the grain line.

To be honest I can't remember if the grain lines run perfectly along the braces or not. I seem to remember it looked ok but seeing small "whirls" for want of a better word in the grain being visible in the grain on the tops. I will check this out.
Author:  WaddyThomson [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 8:19 am ]
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All brace wood is not created equally.  Some has little curves in the grain lines, and you have to work around those.  Michael is right, and if the grain is not vertical, you need to find what is vertical.  Splitting in half with the grain will give you the grain line, if you can't see it.  Then you can line that up and saw parallel to that plane, and then square the edges and cut your braces.  I just recently learned this myself.  It was a great lesson.  I wasted at least one whole 6" piece of brace stock trying to get to that myself.  It became kindling.
Author:  WaddyThomson [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 8:20 am ]
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[QUOTE=Cachalote]Thanks for the replies.



Michael,



As far as I can remember ( I don't have the wood in front of me at the moment) The lines don't look like grain lines , they look like a different density of wood.



The grain at the end of the brace blank is nearly perfectly vertical and where these other lines meet the end if the blank you can also see they cross the blank perpendicular to the grain line.



To be honest I can't remember if the grain lines run perfectly along the braces or not. I seem to remember it looked ok but seeing small "whirls" for want of a better word in the grain being visible in the grain on the tops. I will check this out.[/QUOTE]

That sounds like silking.  Like you find in tops.  Same wood.
Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 8:59 am ]
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Waddy I don't think it is medulary rays it is too dense and consistent in several areas. It sure looks like run-out to me. I see some light near truly elliptical shapes near the dense dark area. those could likely be medulary ray. but the majority of what I see sure looks like run-out to be a bigger photo might help.

I truly suspect that the run-out is in sort of a twist or bi-axial run-out. There!!!! I used a little big word today My day is complette
Author:  grumpy [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 9:34 am ]
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Guys, we're trying to judge a tiny piece of wood, in the world's worst photograph. I mean, it's a better photo of then plane than the wood.

We need a much better, close-up photo if you want to get proper help.
Author:  Jody [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 12:19 pm ]
Post subject: 
 Well cachalot, since we realy cant see the pic too good, you have two schools  of thought going here ,, if it is runout  you have a problem , if it is medulary rays , which are only seen in perfectly quartered wood , like you are describing in your response to micheal  , you are golden 1   Jody
Author:  Chuck Hutchison [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 3:40 pm ]
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Grumpy's right, I had to stand on my head to look at it.  Need more data.
Author:  Ken Franklin [ Mon Jan 14, 2008 5:59 pm ]
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If it really is well-quartered it could be bear claw figure.
Author:  Hesh [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 12:01 am ]
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Achem's Razor.........
Author:  Chuck Hutchison [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 2:00 am ]
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[QUOTE=Hesh]Achem's Razor......... [/QUOTE]


Occam's razor

a principle named after William of Occam, a 14th century philosopher. The generalization states that, if there are a number of explanations for observed phenomena, the simplest explanation is preferred.
Author:  Hesh [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 3:52 am ]
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Thanks Chuck!
Author:  Richard_N [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 4:36 am ]
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Thanks for the replys Guys.

Yeah I know the pictures bad !! I did take some close ups but they came out even worse than that one ! (Yeah REALY it is possible !!! Cheap camera and working at night )

Anyway I managed to get some close ups in the daylight today ( Unfortunately the camera focused on my hands rather than the wood ) .

I sanded the end of the brace more and you can actualy see that the grain is verticle but with some kinks in. It seems to be these kinks which become the steaks on the side.

Is this bear claw like Ken suggested ?

Is it OK to use as braces ?

Anyway the photos:

End view


Top view


Side view


Thanks
Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 4:41 am ]
Post subject: 
Wavy grain run-out
Author:  Dennis Leahy [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 5:06 am ]
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Great photos! Now we can see it!

The way I see it, that is bearclaw, although bearclaw is typically confined to just a few annular rings.

Dennis
Author:  grumpy [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 5:30 am ]
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Nice wood. Use it and enjoy.
Author:  Michael Dale Payne [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 6:01 am ]
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I could be very wrong here but I have always thought that BC or curl was cause by the collapse of new growth cell while still in the more or less viscous state thus causing a disruption in the fibers grain producing an end grain effect perpendicular to the growth ring axis. The photo of the end grain picture shows the ring uninterrupted but deformed onto a wave.

Am i over looking the obvious here?
Author:  Dennis Leahy [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 6:39 am ]
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Michael,

I have bearclaw tops that look very much like the end grain photo above. Again, from what I have seen, bearclaw seems to be typically more random and affecting just a few layers of annular rings (which is why it does not bookmatch well), but I would still call this bearclaw. If you have any bearclaw Spruce where the claw mark comes all the way to the end of the board, look at the end grain and you'll see something very similar to that photo (though maybe the ripples do not continue through the entire thickness of the board.)

To my thinking, curl figure is a 3D ripple in grain in the Y plane of a standing tree. This figure shown here is (to me) in the X or Z plane (take your pick, depending on your reference point, I'd probably say Z.)

I may be full of hooey, but that's the way I'd explain bearclaw. For Richard's original question, the brace stock looks properly cut to my (admittedly beginner luthier) eyes. In fact, it looks real good.

Dennis
Author:  hansonitis [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 7:41 am ]
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Given your new set of pictures I'm going to join the chorus who say this is bearclaw. It looks exactly the same as the wavy figure evident in spruce logs (evidencing bearclaw) after they have been debarked.

Greg
Author:  Richard_N [ Tue Jan 15, 2008 7:22 pm ]
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Thanks Guys
Author:  Ken Franklin [ Wed Jan 16, 2008 2:47 am ]
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Now that I see you were planing parallel to the annular rings I agree that it is
wavy grain run-out and not bear claw. You don't really see any bear claw on
the photo of the annular ring face. I agree with Mario, looks like nice wood.
No problems.
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