I get a lot of emails from folks who have a tree in their backyard that is coming down, wondering if it might be good for musical instruments...
I think that this is the first time--in 35 years of doing this--that the answer was "yes"...
Here is the tree in question:
They took it out to get rid of the huge mess it made every fall...
Here's the rub...
After the tree was on the ground, the faller cut it into 14" long sections...ugggh!
That tree would have loved to have been made into cellos (or even basses), but que sera sera, that's the way things go...
I thought this might be a good opportunity to show how one might process a tree for mandolins, without using a sawmill. Most builders think you need a lot of tools and knowhow to process instrument wood, but in most regards, it's just like cutting firewood...
Trees like this are not all that rare, but getting to them before they become firewood is, and in this case the decision was already made by the feller that we might get mandolins and mandolins only (fiddles need to be 15" long)...
In any event, I'll get violin/viola neckblocks, which always seem to be in short supply around here...
Anyway, here's how one might go about processing something like this...
Using a froe or wedges and a maul, the "good stuff" is liberated from the lengths...
Make your splits dead-on quarter, and work around the round...
Bookmarks