September slabs and more good wood.

Hello folks. Its been a bit since I last did  a blog and pictures, and its woodworking time again. I have several nice new slabs to show and lots of new lumber. I will be getting more out of the kiln in October and I hope to show some exceptional tiger maple slabs.

For now , we have some cherry crotch, walnut crotch and curly cherry slabs and curly walnut board sets. Along with the usual tiger maple, flame birch, birdseye maple and other things. Now for the pictures.

The above are a walnut crotch and a cherry crotch. I planed them a bit and put some naphtha to show the grain.The size of these are about 38" long, 21" wide and about 2" thick. I will be getting some more out of the kiln soon, I hope. Not sure of the price on these yet as I have to see if they have matched pieces yet in the kiln. I am guessing they will start about 275$ each. They are really nice. 

I do have other slabs as well. Some curly cherry with some bug holes are this pair below.

They are about 60" long, 1.5 to 2" thick and have great figure. Then I have this pair of curved cherry ones as well.

Next is a pair of walnut bookmatched slabs with a crotch.These are longer and wider.

I also have a few pieces of wide curly walnut. This starts at 10$ board foot. Some has gone since I took the picture this morning.

I have other pieces available as well. A couple sets of huge mulberry slabs from an old church are really nice. Great edge grain as well as nice crotch figure in those. I also have lots of new birdseye maple, flame birch , curly cherry and tiger maple. The curly cherry is the only thing I have  in 4/4 stock. The rest is available in thicknesses up to 4" thick in some and 2" thick in others. I am getting a good supple of 5/4

stock in tiger maple and birdseye maple. Let me know what you might need. I also am selling "brown" tiger maple that has brown heartwood on one surface or maybe both faces. It runs 3.50 ft in 20 ft lots. I do have some 8/4 stock in that as well. That runs 4.75 ft.

I also have about 300 ft of wide butternut stock in 1" thicknesses. It runs from 10" wide to 13" . Its $5.75 ft.
I think that's it for this letter.

Its fall in Wisconsin

Its fall now and its funny how the days can be so cold and then so pleasant. Got the small addition going up on the shop so I can have one place to store all the lumber. It will be really nice. Its just a steel addition , but I will be able to sort and stack all the lumber so I can find what I need sooner.With the help of family and friends, its coming together. Today was just beautiful. Almost t shirt weather. 50's and sunny.

Here is where I started

The steel is going on today, tomorrow I hope the roof goes on. The its finishing the trim and installing the overhead doors. Can't wait to start filling it.

I'll be able to start sorting all the birdseye , curly and flame and getting some stacks started. Have a good one!

box sides and lumber shipments

The new year has started out very well. Got lots of stuff shipped this week. Working on the details of the grandfather clock and the spice chest with Charles Neil. Hope to get some stuff finalized soon, so I can get the material and figure out some pricing options. See the links at Charles' site about these 2 projects. They will be beauties..
http://intheworkshop.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/spice-chest-townsend-clock-wood-kits/

I will be writing another wood newsletter. If you want a copy, email me at bob at bobkloes.com or go to my website and email from there. www.bobkloes.com

Got some super flame birch. Make beautiful furniture and cabinets.

This is the top half of a flame birch chimney cupboard. It was done in a lockwood dye. I love the reds on flame birch. Charles just did a table in flame birch he got from me. It is in his paid video series.
I will say this. I have been building furniture since 1979. I have been watching his paid show since it started. I have learned something with every piece he has done. I have read books and watched lots of guys teach and show. Nothing quite compares to his. Its down and dirty and mistakes happen. That's what makes it so good. Mistakes happen to all of us. The only difference is, the more years you have doing something, the better you are at fixing the problems. That is where he shines. Just lots of good info and solid building techniques. If I can learn, anyone can. It is worth the money, hands down. For less then the cost of a fancy handplane, you can get a whole year's worth of shows.

Well I guess that is it for now. We have had such nice weather. I don't recall too many years here in north east Wisconsin with 50 degree days the first week of January, but tomorrow we are getting snow, so the dead brown grass will be covered. Hope it doesn't last too long. Take care.

Big slabs, trimming and planing and just about killing myself....

Had 5 big white pine slabs. Over  eight feet long and 26" wide. Had to get 4 of them planed up and ready to be picked up. They will go into bar tops. Yep, lots of bars in Wisconsin.

 Its nice when 2 boards cover the width of the truck box

 Got one on the cart, ready to trim off the edge

These are all 2.5" thick, kiln dried with one natural edge. Nice tight knots. All came from 1 tree. Blew down in a storm. The thing is with these, some people like the bark left on. I have 1 slab left and am peeling the bark off. I love the texture the edge shows with the bark off.
I forgot how heavy these can be, even in white pine. I am 215 lbs, but these were close in weight to me. I was moving slow after I got done yesterday. But it sure is fun to work wood that size and shape. Just some very cool looking stuff.  The swirls and knots and figure are just cool. God does create some really cool things.