Cottonwood & Sycamore

I have a neighbor who has offered me a large sycamore and even larger (3 foot diameter) cottonwood. I've heard that the cottonwood is good for turning and that the sycamore is extremely hard which is good for things like cutting boards. Is this true?

Hank:
I've been told by a "semi-" reliable source that cottonwood is quite valuable and that much of it is being shipped to Asia. If you don't want to use it yourself, you may find a market for it if you check around.
Rich

Have the sycamore quartersawn. Gorgeous stuff.

Cottonwood is an almost bland creamy white that often has a shimmering chatoyance - I think it is pretty in a grainless sort of way. Sycamore can be awesome; it should be quartersawn for two reasons: it is notoriously unstable otherwise and the ray fleck pattern that results is a bit like leopardwood or lacewood.

Both of these are bottomland trees with lots of water that needs to leave the wood; they shrink a lot. What remains in each case is a light weight wood of surprising strength. Sycamore is between cherry and poplar in hardness; not particularly hard. I don't think it would make my Top Five Woods for Cutting Boards list, especially since the lacey grain has softer wood in between the outlines which could capture food particles.

Here is a page with Forestry Service data on each: http://www.windsorplywood.com/nam_hardwoodspage.html

See Woodweb.com for info on air drying etc.

They are logging cottonwood around here lately and, they are paying 9 cents a board foot to the owners for it. I am not sure you are going to get rich at that rate but maybe if you have enough. I would guess they have stacked 50 to 100 thousand board feet around here. It takes awhile to add up at that price.

As far as I know it is all going to a pallet mill

Hank,
I have no experience with cottonwood so can't help you there but have used qt-sawn sycamore in cutting boards. Qt-sawn sycamore is one of my favorite looking woods but I would not recommend it for a cutting board for the reasons given above. It's grain patterns are awesome but tend to be brittle and flake off during planing.

I put it very high on the list for something like a box. Sycamore is not especially hard or as compared to hickory oak or maple, but it is stringy and tough to split for fire wood. That is why some folks may think it is "extremely hard".

Around these parts cottonwood is considered trash not because it's bad wood but, because it is very bland (no grain and no color) and because it tends to check very badly in the drying process. Sycamore is another story. I like sycamore and made a desk for my brother out of some that happened to have some very slight spalting in it.