Curly ash

[watopeka]

Is curly ash as hard as maple and for staining as easy as any other wood. The gun from olskool is absolutely beautiful, very different if any of you have some of those toys made with this wood would love to see them. Nice to be different

 

[Ames]

Almost as hard. Hardness is done as a impact test. Search for the Janka Hardness test. It will list the results in order of anything you are likely to consider for gun building. I kept it handy for furniture building 40 years ago.
An interesting read- White Ash scores 1320. Hard maple 1450. My favorite wood after ash to work with is black cherry (950), followed by apple. Apple scores a surprising 1730! Surprised me because when its fresh green wood it cuts like Play dough on a lathe!

 

[smo]

Ash makes a beautiful gun for sure.

If memory serves me correctly it’s what baseball bats were made of.... prior to aluminum.

 

[oldwood]

Ash is a fun wood to work on gun stocks. Once I finish sanded a typically hard ash stock w/ 60 grit paper , and it looked good as one I started at 60 and finished at 120. The stocks in ash I've stained come out to a mellow reddish tan. Somebody likes them , 'cause I can't keep them on hand. ...........oldwood

 

[Grenadier1758]

Because of the emerald ash borer there will be a lot less ash available for either gun stocks or baseball bats.

 

[erhunter]

Ash makes a beautiful gun for sure.

If memory serves me correctly it’s what baseball bats were made of.... prior to aluminum.

I just recently moved to Benton, Pa. and the locals here told me there used to be a baseball bat company located here that produced the bats for the MLB. Unfortunately the ash borer killed the local ash trees and the local bat factory. All of the ash trees in our area are dead and falling over.

 

[hanshi]

In my hometown in Georgia there used to be a baseball bat mfg. plant near the "Chicopee cotton mill" - it's where rifles and the double barrel cannon were made during the WBS. The bat plant was, IIRC, the Hannah Bat Company. Gone for many years now but I remember so well walking past it going into town and smelling the fine scent of cut wood. We seem to be losing our trees big time. First the chestnut, now the ash, elm and a spruce/fir, can't remember which is being killed by the brown tailed moth. Of course there are others.

 

[Kansas Jake]

I have an ash tree that will be coming down this winter. It isn't the largest, but is probably 18-20 inches in diameter near the base. I've contemplated having some planks cut from it, but it may not be big enough to be useful

 

[Cattman]

the one stock i did in curly ash was real stable but it took, a lot more stain than maple. alot more. turned out perfect but different then normal woods for a gun stock.

 

[Ricochet]

Heres a few pics of my Kibler. I used aquafortis to stain it. It has quite a few thin coats of tru oil on top

 

[Ricochet]

The last Louisville slugger I used was Ash. I would assume the majority of bats are still ash but when I finished up in ‘92 I noticed alot of Maple being used. It would be a shame to not be able to use the LS ash bats as they just felt better to me. This is one of the bats I used, it is Ash. When I saw the Kibler for sale on the forums here I jumped on it because it just seems right to use an Ash stocked rifle to me for personal reasons. I also think that it looks good so thats a bonus!!

 

[oldwood]

Jake...... All the ash I had come my way was salvage wood left by loggers in a hurry to get to the next job. So ,it was me and the saw mill operator to figure out what to do. I figured a wide gunstock needed 2 7/8" width after drying , and planing . So , had the sawyer cut the boards 3 inch width. Since it was ash , the cambium layer is almost irrelevant and a stock can be laid out right to the edge of the plank. Knowing this , have the sawyer not square up the slabs, Just take them as they fall the log, and stack the slabs w/ strips between them . I had no building to store the planks , so just stacked , stripped between , and covered the stack w/used tin roofing. Three years later , gunstocks.........Hope this helps .........oldwood

 

[MSW]

wow - that Kibler looks nice

 

[Flintandsteel]

Ash is hard for sure. It has open grain structure and can be splintery. Makes a beautiful rifle stock, but not ideal for carving. This is a NC file I built a couple years ago.

 

[Kansas Jake]

Thanks Oldwood and Flintandsteel that is one nice looking rifle.

 

[Flinty Scot]

The grain of those ash stocks are striking. Could a borer-killed tree be any good for stock wood? Local wood workers have made beautiful table tops from the, which arte clearly still sound. Or have I wauted too long after the kill-off ...again.

 

[Kansas Jake]

My understanding is the borer only effect the outer surface under the bark of the trunk and the interior should be good.

 

[tom mesa]

Here is a nice ash stocked rifle I got from John Bergmann several years ago.It is a .50 cal , good shooter.

 

[Cpt Flint]

Pecatonica had three blanks of Ash that was graded #5 curly. I bought all three of them and have just finished the last one.
All SMR or North Carolina. I am imminently pleased with the wood. I used Kelly's medium brown leather dye and about 20 coats of Valspar Teak Oil hand rubbed.

 

[B P Arn]

For what it is worth, a lot of Fender electric guitar bodies were made of ash, at least in the old days.