Tricks for removing sapwood from winter cut hickory?

[Aaron H]

I have some hickory that I cut back in September.  When I cut it I was hoping the sap was still running, well it wasn't.  The bark was stuck.  So now I am trying to remove the sapwood and it is proving to be a major pain.  Anyone have any tricks or advise?

[gutpile]

first off you are trying to remove bark, not sapwood, sapwood is what you will build your bow out of with hickory.... much easier to remove bark from summer cut..just pops off...not sure of any tricks to try...maybe steam...but don't bet on it....draw knife is probably your best bet now..sorry...gut

[Blaflair2]

A old spoon works well, it scrapes off without digging the wood, also I've heard of putting in the bathroom for a week or two and it will semi rehydrate

[bubbles]

We're talking about the cambium layer correct?  I just did it with some elm I cut too early in the spring.  I just soaked a towel in really hot water and laid in on a limb for about 20 minutes- 1/2 an hour. Then,attack it with a spoon.   I found it worked quite well.  When it starts to dry out and becomes hard to scrape with the spoon, simply wet it again.   You will need to set aside your stave for a couple days after as this definitely adds moisture. 

Mike.

[Aaron H]

Yea, my bad. I meant scraping of the inner bark to get to the cambium layer.

[Aaron H]

The stave it's still very green, as I just cut it back in September.  I just wanted to get it roughed out to speed up the drying process

[Chief RID]

As it dries out it may sand off. I had a Sassafras stave that I had a lot of cambium left and someone told me about trying to sand instead of the draw knife. I left some so it gives it a good look, I think.

[RyanY]

I've been able to peel massive pieces of bark off of winter cut hickory with a draw knife. Just peels right off once you get the edge under it.

[Aaron H]

Yea, with this being my first time working with hickory I worked most of the bark off already with a draw knife.  So I am left with small non continuous pieces of inner bark. So unfortunately large pieces peeling off is no longer an option.

Thanks guys, I believe I will give the spoon trick a shot with a little steam

[George Tsoukalas]

You don't have to get all of the inner bark off. You can leave some. Jawge

[Aaron H]

Yea, I think I will leave some George.  I like the looks of it with some bark left on.

[Badger]

   Once I start getting close to the wood I use a rasp and just rasp until I see a little white. I grind the corners of my scraper into a radius that is good at getting the bark out of the furroughs.

[Ink]

this thread probably contains some of the most handy tricks for working on winter cut hickory that i've ever seen. I have a bunch sitting on a rack myself that I was dreading to work on. Think I'm gonna try tackling them now.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Cut it in the spring...

[Drewster]

I had 21 pairs of billets to process in the late winter last year from a huge hickory that fell in a neighbors yard.  After a billet or two, I figured out it was going to take me half of forever to do them by hand, so I resorted to my band saw for help.  The bark on these hickory pieces was an inch thick, so working with care I was able to remove the biggest majority of the bark.  It saved me hours of work.  Once the bulk of the bark was removed, I finished them off with my draw knife and scrapers.  It worked well for me in that situation.