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Wood source

Hi, why the oak? It is a type of wood with large grains. In my experience it is hard to work with in miniature modelling.
 
There are many varieties of Oak. The oak commonly found for sale at lumberyards and home improvement stores is Red Oak. This was not used for marine construction applications as it has very poor resistance to rot. As its name implies it is also pink in color.

The two Oak varieties used for shipbuilding were Live Oak and White Oak. Live Oak is not commercially harvested these days. Mystic Seaport that operates its own shipyard relies on trees downed in Southern States from Hurricanes.

White Oak is commercially available from specialty lumber dealers. For small quantities you might try Woodcraft Supply. They’re on the web. White oak strips. You’ll probably have to cut them yourself.

BTW, how much do you need. I had some, years ago. Not sure if I still have it.

Roger
 
Oak is very coarse grained, resembling clumps of straw-like tubes surrounding by denser wood. See below. WHen you make tiny parts from red oak, they tend to break at the porous areas. Large pieces of oak don't have that problem. For modelling, beech is often used to simulate the appearance oak hulls of ships in a model. It has a fine grain and is easy to work with. Pear is expensive, but one of the best woods. I use walnut and cherry because they are easily obtained in my area.

Oak under a magnifying glass
1727565432042.png

Beech. It looks like oak in small scale on a model ship.
1727565592799.png
 
Checked my lumber stash. Can’t find any oak. I must have used it for something I can’t remember.

I missed the obvious source. Dave Stevens aka The Lumberyard. He lives somewhere in Northern Ohio; White Oak Territory.

Roger
 
i have so much white and red Oak about 5 tons, i use it to heat my house.

to mill it that small i do not think it would hold together
i will give it a try i have some lumber in the barn but i think Beech is a better choice
 
i did a test with Oak i milled out a couple strips 1mm x 6mm go back to post #6 and you can see Beech does look like scale Oak
so with 6mm wide strips you do get the larger looking streaks in Oak. but not as bad as i thought. i don't know how an entire hull planked with Oak will look like.

oak1.jpg

then i took the strips and bent them to see what will happed, not bad at all it took quite a bend and this is dry no soaking or using heat.

oak2.jpg

here i maxed out the bend you can see at the top of the bend. It did kink but it did not break

the oak you would buy in a store is dried to about 6% the Oak i bent is air dried to around 12 to 15% moisture. but if you soak the strips it might bend ok

oak3.jpg
 
I have recently bought 3 lots of boxwood from this UK firm. I am very happy with the quality I got. They often sell bundles of smaller pieces, which are very useful to chaps like us.

www.ebay.co.uk

Castello Boxwood Off cuts random sizes approx 6" long - (1 Kilo) | eBay UK

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Castello Boxwood Off cuts random sizes approx 6" long - (1 Kilo) at the best online prices at eBay UK! Free delivery for many products!
www.ebay.co.uk
 
Alan Smith said:
I have recently bought 3 lots of boxwood from this UK firm. I am very happy with the quality I got. They often sell bundles of smaller pieces, which are very useful to chaps like us.

www.ebay.co.uk

Castello Boxwood Off cuts random sizes approx 6" long - (1 Kilo) | eBay UK

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Castello Boxwood Off cuts random sizes approx 6" long - (1 Kilo) at the best online prices at eBay UK! Free delivery for many products!
www.ebay.co.uk
Click to expand...
unfortunately not for chaps' in the US

1729863492945.png
 
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