what a waste

[Timbuck]

I started off with a 50 mm thick block of Brazilian Mahogany cost me £40 re-sawed it carefuly into ten 4mm slices so 10 mm = 20% turned into sawdust.. I mark out and trim the edges to ukulele shape and 25% of the "off cuts" end up in the bin, now with 45 % gone I take the ten 4mm slices to the thickness sander and thickness them down to 1.8mm thats another 45% gone into sawdust...so in my calculation i've ended up with only 10% of the original block of wood and I still have to trim the edges and cut out the sound holes and dovetail pockets..and if it was a cutaway even more gone :wallbash:
Can someone please double check these figures.

No wonder it takes two of us to empty the full dust extracor bin.

 

[mikeyb2]

Now this is what I call a waste of wood: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S34e2_wj9ZE

 

[bazuku]

Your reckoning aside, Ken … this is a very disappointing aspect of woodworking with 'wafers'.
I can only dream of your efficiency. I cut everything (top, back and sides) on a specially jigged TABLE saw... talk about waste. My band saw is not up to the task of re-sawing billets, so I buy in DAR boards or rough sawn planks, and this allows me to minimise waste just a little. If I end up with more than 30% of my wood after the initial re-saw, I consider it a major triumph. After planing and thicknessing there is not much left, cents in the dollar-wise.
I have the added aggravation of being sawdust averse, so adding insult to injury, I usually end up liberally coated from head to toe in a small percentage of my wood purchases.

 

[printer2]

I can't remember if I posted this here or not, found the most flawless 2x4 stud after years of picking through Home Depot's pallets. Did a rough calculation, decided to go for it. Cut it into two lengths, resawed the one, took two sheets off the other, laminated them together for the top back and sides. The rest of the solid wood was used to make the neck. Other than the neck blocks and the brown bits, I made up a Martin 00 sized guitar.

To say the least, I was concerned at various points whether I overestimated how much wood I had to use. I need to finish this one, just need to do the frets, mount the tuners and bridge. Mind you, cost me less than the Mahogany.

 

[ksquine]

It gets worse man.....all that work of cutting, thinning, trimming is not value add labor from a Lean manufacturing point of view.

You wasted all that time spent wasting all that wood!! :nana:

 

[printer2]

We need a stiff razor edged tool to resaw with. One cut, perfect surface, no muss no fuss, no waste. And cheap.

 

[Moore Bettah Ukuleles]

And you’re forgetting about all the waste at the sawmill getting that finished board to you.

 

[bazuku]

…. and all of those larger limbs that get left on the forest floor or chipped for composite sheeting. A lot of uke sized wood is squandered and left to rot, or fuel wild/bush fires. Anyone for a chipboard ukulele ???

 

[printer2]

…. and all of those larger limbs that get left on the forest floor or chipped for composite sheeting. A lot of uke sized wood is squandered and left to rot, or fuel wild/bush fires. Anyone for a chipboard ukulele ???

Actually a chipboard out of exotic woods might be interesting.

 

[Jardin]

Well although I agree with all said here... as I tend to think of these things as I am re-sawing sanding and all that...I disagree to a certain extent.

Waste is when you throw it all away willy nilly and do not use it.....However, if you put waste into a system that feeds on it....Like... feed it to worms or mulch a tree, compost it down, then it becomes food not waste....A dead tree on the forest floor is full of life and in the proper system nothing that breaks down and does not pollute the system is waste...It is food. Being that I am also an Organic Farmer I am just feeding the soil and the worms which in turn grows food....

It still sucks but I dare say it is just as important to feed the soil as it is to make an instrument. At least it is a natural substance that is non-pollutive.

Just another way to look at it anyway!

 

[Timbuck]

Well although I agree with all said here... as I tend to think of these things as I am re-sawing sanding and all that...I disagree to a certain extent.

Waste is when you throw it all away willy nilly and do not use it.....However, if you put waste into a system that feeds on it....Like... feed it to worms or mulch a tree, compost it down, then it becomes food not waste....A dead tree on the forest floor is full of life and in the proper system nothing that breaks down and does not pollute the system is waste...It is food. Being that I am also an Organic Farmer I am just feeding the soil and the worms which in turn grows food....

It still sucks but I dare say it is just as important to feed the soil as it is to make an instrument. At least it is a natural substance that is non-pollutive.

Just another way to look at it anyway!

All my sawdust is composted in 3 compost bins ..it takes about one year to turn the sawdust into rich soil that goes into my garden flower beds and veggie patch.

 

[WebParrot (s2)]

Can you image how wastefully guilty that Michelangelo felt when, upon finishing the " Pieta' " he looked down and saw all that wasted marble ...

https://www.michelangelo.org/

 

[JJohansen]

That's just a taste of what happens taking the tree through the sawmill. Every chainsaw cut is nearly 1\2" lost, every pass with the saw blade is nearly 3 \16 lost. If your equipment is not configured correctly, you get wavy cuts and more waste. Just getting true quartersawn lumber is significantly more waste than just sawing for grade. Every cut you take is sacrificing another cut, and I've literally lost sleep over how to cut very curly koa logs. If you are cutting for instrument stock, how thick you cut also can cause or save a lot of waste (orphan slices) Drying is another great opportunity to ruin and waste perfectly good wood. I've seen hundreds of board feet ruined by impatience and ineptitude. Probably the biggest waste is caused by nature herself (if you want to look at it that way). I can't remember how many times I've found massive koa logs just riddled with curl that were completely rotten.

 

[Henning]

If you for instance could saw to 2 mm instead of 4 mm there would be a lot won in less waste. If so, the time spent sanding and creating saw dust would be less too.
But I don´t know what limits are necessary in your band saw.
Assumably, as you saw to 4 mm it´s probably where you have a safe margin, isn´t it?
Otherwise you would have made the plates 2 mm in the first place.
Regards

 

[Timbuck]

I repaired an old island style soprano a while back and I noticed that the inside of the top and back plates were not sanded, just sawn finish...that would save a bit

 

[Titchtheclown]

I repaired an old island style soprano a while back and I noticed that the inside of the top and back plates were not sanded, just sawn finish...that would save a bit

In the pre industrial sander days leaving the unexposed surfaces of woodwork unfinished with a plane or adze was common in cheaper timber buildings and furniture. It was known as half adzed work.
A lot of people still use a slight corruption of that term for poor quality or lazy work practices.

 

[Henning]

I don´t like the idea of leaving what is supposed to in some degree be a high quality instrument unsanded. I can understand that for an industrially built instrument in a big volume production. But not for something that aspires to be a quality product, i.e. hand built. If building directly from the sawn plate, without sanding, the surface will be more rough, thereby (my guess) a bigger surface taking up, but also leaving humidity faster as it changes. A sanded surface will be nicer to handle too.

 

[Brett S.]

It's hard for me to think in terms of "waste" when a block of wood is turned into multiple musical instruments.