Author Topic: Moisture Content for Hackberry  (Read 3012 times)

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Offline Gaust

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Moisture Content for Hackberry
« on: November 24, 2013, 12:37:26 am »
I've got this stave to floor tiller stage, with about 4" of bend, plenty of thickness left.   I have it at around 6 to 7% right now, measured by a moisture meter.  It's been sitting inside the house the last couple of days in 40% average relative humidity.  Is it ready to move to the final shaping and tree tillering stage you think?  I read somewhere that this wood needs to be dryer than most.
George

Offline osage outlaw

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #1 on: November 24, 2013, 12:58:34 am »
When did you cut the tree?
I started out with nothin' and I still got most of it left

Offline Gaust

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #2 on: November 24, 2013, 01:15:42 am »
It was cut 10/27/2013.

Offline osage outlaw

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #3 on: November 24, 2013, 01:26:50 am »
Do you have a hot box?
I started out with nothin' and I still got most of it left

Offline Joec123able

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #4 on: November 24, 2013, 01:41:59 am »
So it's less then a month cut and you've already got it to 7% how?? If by just air drying then your moisture meters wrong
I like osage

Offline rabbitassasin

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #5 on: November 24, 2013, 03:29:27 am »
i also am interested as i have some hack that was cut in march (03) and it seems pretty dry to me!

Offline dbb

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #6 on: November 24, 2013, 05:44:03 am »
Take the guesswork out of it and check the weight instead.
Just weigh it say twice a week until it stops loosing weight.
The only moisturemeters i trust is pro grade and those puppies are pricey !
It's better to ask and look like a fool than not to ask and remain one...

Offline DarkSoul

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #7 on: November 24, 2013, 07:52:07 am »
No way the wood is dry! Don't tiller for at least another two weeks, preferably more.
"Sonuit contento nervus ab arcu."
Ovid, Metamorphoses VI-286

Offline PEARL DRUMS

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #8 on: November 24, 2013, 08:57:15 am »
Hackberry is super light weight and dries super fast. If you have it sized as you say, keep it in the house at 40-50% humidity for at least a few more weeks. I think my first HB bow was a bow about 6-7 weeks after I cut it. If you continue as is your bow will take 5"-6" of set. Hackberry is a 8-9% wood, too dry and it will blow in tension. Too green and it takes alot of set.
Only when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught will we realize we cannot eat money.

Offline Gaust

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #9 on: November 24, 2013, 09:46:27 am »
Thanks, everyone.  Consensus seems to be that I need to wait a few more weeks.  I've kept the stave clamped to a straight 2x4 next to the return air grille in the house where the air movement is the greatest.  When I had it in the garage in the beginning I had a fan on it continuously, but soon moved it into the house when the humidity rose after some rains.  When I put my $12 moisture meter on it in the garage, it did read 11% MC.  After I moved it into the house for a while, it now reads 6 to 7%.  Just did not want to get it too dry.  But keeping it in the house for a few more weeks won't hurt it.
George

Offline toomanyknots

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Re: Moisture Content for Hackberry
« Reply #10 on: November 24, 2013, 10:19:16 am »
Hot boxing helps hackberry a lot. You can easily get zero set with hackberry if it is nice and dry, and good wood of course. Plus it smells awesome when it "cooks",  ;D.
"The way of heaven is like the bending of a bow-
 the upper part is pressed down,
 the lower part is raised up,
 the part that has too much is reduced,
 the part that has too little is increased."

- Tao Te Ching, 77, A new translation by Victor H. Mair