# Milling a hunk of chinese elm



## sleddude5

Yesterday I spent some quality time with my CSM and a hunk of chinese elm. The log is about 6 feet long and was 30" in diameter. Got some cool boards out of it.

36" Alaskan with my MS460 and 32" bar.

Hope you like the pics!
Jerry C


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## BobL

Nice wood ! - Real Nice


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## bruiser 1

Sorry Jerry but, chinese Elm is "PISS WOOD" not good for much of anything . very wet, takes long time to dry out, no structual strength, makes alot of ash, but It will burn if dry enough not very well. We have tons in Colorado.


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## sleddude5

I know that. 

But I'll make something out of it, nothing I have goes to waste.

Jerry C


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## mtngun

Great pics ! Looks like a smooth finish -- what kind of chain was used ?


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## deeker

Great job on the elm. I use it for stickers, and have cut out siding for sheds. As well as a lot of 2x4's and bigger boards/beams.

One very tough wood. Also for oxen yokes, and farm implement handles. Bread boards and the old buck board wagons.


Elm

The hard-as-nails hardwood with beauty a burl deep




Throughout history, man has chosen elm when he needed a tough and durable wood. Wheelwrights fashioned wheel hubs from nothing but the rugged elm, and then used it to floor long-lasting wagon beds. The Chinese called elm y�mu, and worked it into utilitarian furniture that would take abuse. Fine furnituremakers called on elm, too, but in the form of burl veneer from a species growing in Europe's Carpathian Mountains.

In early America, Iroquois Indians tempered fever with a medicine derived from the inner bark of the slippery elm. Years later, players in the new game of baseball chewed this same elm bark to produce a sticky saliva, which when rubbed into the pocket of their glove, made balls easier to catch.

Despite its many uses, elm's primary fame has come from its graceful beauty and the shade it provides. From France to Middle America, elm once lined miles of city streets and country byways. Today, unfortunately, elm trees are being killed by a spreading fungus called Dutch elm disease. Efforts to control the disease haven't been successful. Fortunately, the propagation of hybrid, disease-resistant trees shows promise.


Wood identification
Elm claims about 20 species in the temperate regions of the world. The most well known include the stately American elm (Ulmus Americana) and the slippery elm (Ulmus rubra) of the United States, and the English elm (Ulmus procera) in Europe and Great Britain.

In the forest, elm often grows 140' tall. But open-grown elms rarely reach that height. Instead, they form a spreading, umbrella-like crown valued for shade.

The English and American elms have deeply fissured bark with crisscrossing ridges of an ash-gray color. The bark of slippery elm is the same color, but lacks pattern.

You can identify elm easily by its leaves. About 5" long and 3" wide, they have saw-toothed edges ending in a sharp point.

Elm heartwood ranges in tone from reddish brown to light tan, while the sapwood approaches off-white. The usually dramatic grain resembles ash. Moderately dense, elm weighs nearly 40 lbs. per cubic foot dry.

American and slippery elm will root practically everywhere east of the Rocky Mountains (except for the high Appalachians and the southern tip of Florida). You'll find elm growing in river bottoms and on low, fertile hills mixed with other species of hardwoods.


Working properties
Hard and tough, elm still bends easily when steamed, and when dry, holds its shape. Its twisted, interlocking grain makes elm difficult to work with anything but power tools. It also won't split when screwed or nailed, but demands drilling pilot holes. And the wood sands easily to a natural low luster.

Burl veneers tend to be brittle and troublesome to flatten. Try those with flexible backing.


Uses in woodworking
Besides the frequent use of its veneer for paneling, furnituremakers take advantage of elm's ruggedness for hidden furniture parts. You'll often find it in chair and sofa frames, backs, and legs. Yet elm's beautiful wood grain also has fine furniture possibilities.

Elm works well, too, for butcher block tops and cutting boards because it has no odor or taste, and it won't split. When in contact with water, elm resists decay, so many boatbuilders use it for planking.


Cost and availabilitly
Today, most elm lumber goes for manufacturing use and very little finds its way to retail outlets. Where you do find it--usually at small, local sawmills--it costs less than $2 a board foot compared to nearly twice that for oak and walnut. Native elm veneer sells for about $1 per square foot--Carpathian elm burl about double that.


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## excess650

I've been working on (CSM) a few fairly large diameter red elm logs. The bark resembles what you're cutting but the wood appears darker. You may well get more dramatic looking grain by milling other than parallel to the center.

BTW, that SMELL is from the bark and not from the wood. When I first started milling it I kept wondering where I stepped in dog crap It(freshly peeled bark) sure draws flies and bees!


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## BIG JAKE

Looks good Jerry-how does the 460 work for milling? Nice looking grain and finish on the boards too. Try some small projects and see how it goes. Here's a hutch built out of english elm.


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## irishcountry

Looks beautiful i'd be using it too no matter what!!! great job


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## glennschumann

Elm can look nice, but it can be a beast to work with... I'm finishing a bench for my sister, and even with brand new blades in my planer, and a slow, shallow feed, I was still getting tear out on quarter sawn boards because the grain is rowed. (Growth spirals up the tree one way one year, then the next way the next year). With freshly sharpened hand planes, I can plane it ok, but I'm glad this project is a labor of love, not a profit center... I'd be broke by now. This hasn't stopped me from milling more, however. I've got a few 30 boards, now, and a 50" stump waiting for the mill. Enjoy!


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## sleddude5

FYI, a majority of the boards I have are quartersawn. I would roll the slabs around as needed to get as much quartersawn as I could, it is tough at times though because on one end of the log the grain goes this way, and then is opposite on the other end. 

Yeah, I am not sure if I am looking forward to the planer, but was thinking of planing the wood before it is fully dry to see if it deters tearout.

I did a google search for "chinese elm furniture" and found a lot of cool stuff. I have more to mill yet and am going to leave at least two thick slabs for either a table or bench. After I saw the pics I decided I gotta try it.

This is my first chinese elm milling, and is a welcome change to the oak, pine and ash that has been taking up much of my milling time.

Oh, the 460 is totally stock. The 32" bar, when pushed to the full width, pretty much taxes the saw to the limit when it comes to milling. The saw handles it, but it is not fast. It takes about 5 minutes to mill the full width on a 6' log, but when I mill, I am never in a hurry. I take breaks, and such. I do need an aux oiler, with the 32" bar, I keep an oil squirter handy and stop to oil the tip every couple minutes. FYI, I use the milling chain from Bailey's, I haven't manned up to pay the extra moola for the Granberg chain yet, and have been pretty happy with the Bailey's chain anyway....I just suck at filing it, which is frustrating because I don't have a problem with the firewood chains I have, I just keep practicing, and buying new chains, so I have plenty of sharp ones on hand...lol!

Jerry C


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## BlueRider

sorry to disapoint you but you don't have a chinese elm there. The bark on chinese elm is smooth and scaly and looks very much like sycmore with a slight orange/brown tint to it. Also chinese elm is the only elm I have come across that does not smell like a barn yard when milling. it has a very peppery/spicy scent to it when milling.

I am going to guess that you have an american elm. they are a lighter color and are not as hard or strong as red elm or siberian elm. there are quite a few other types of elm I am not familiar with and it would very well could be one of them. 

I really like all types of elm for building furniture and each has its strengths. american is probably the easiest to work with as it is not so harsh on edge tools, work with a chunk of rock elm and you will know what I mean. Chinese elm makes the finest handles of any wood I have used and is superior to hickory for this purpose. None of the elms are great for carving but chinese elm will hold a fair amount of detail and finishes nicely on a lathe.

All types of elm dry moderately well with very little degrade or checking. when quartersawn it will have very little warping. the slabs I milled at 4" thick dried at 3 5/8" thick.

All elms have interlocking grain, they also encapsulate slica. this means that it will be very harsh on planer knives but on the up side it really won't make much difference which way you send them through the planer. I like to use planner knives converted to a york pitch when planing elm and have found the time it takes well spent. 

After sawing and planing elm you will be surprised by how nicely it sands. It takes any finish well and looks good in contemporary designs as well as period pieces.


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## sleddude5

Thanks for the info. After doing more research I believe you are right. The bark on this tree definately looks more like an American Elm than the Chinese Elm.

Thanks for all the good info!

Jerry C


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## MCW

BobL said:


> Nice wood ! - Real Nice



After seeing that grain I'll have to get stuck into that Chinese Elm log of mine and get some sent over to you as promised Bob.
As mentioned I don't think it is Chinese Elm. Have attached photo of a Chinese Elm I dropped for a guy. Have kept the log and a heap of the larger branches. It is pretty hard and stinks when you cut it  but beautiful grain. Haven't milled it yet.


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## BobL

MCW said:


> After seeing that grain I'll have to get stuck into that Chinese Elm log of mine and get some sent over to you as promised Bob.



Cheers Matt - but no rush.


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## BlueRider

MCW said:


> After seeing that grain I'll have to get stuck into that Chinese Elm log of mine and get some sent over to you as promised Bob.
> As mentioned I don't think it is Chinese Elm. Have attached photo of a Chinese Elm I dropped for a guy. Have kept the log and a heap of the larger branches. It is pretty hard and stinks when you cut it  but beautiful grain. Haven't milled it yet.
> 
> That is defianately a chinese elm. great pic for comparson to the original posters tree.
> 
> I will be very curious to hear Bobs opinon of the wood. I have never been able to find a janka hardness for chineses elm Or any other figures for strength. It is one of my favorites becuse of its strength. Be nice to know how it compares to all the Aussie super woods.
> 
> It dries very nicely. The subtle warm pink tones are transient and it ages to a medium tan.


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## MCW

MCW said:


> Be nice to know how it compares to all the Aussie super woods.



I can tell you now that it is tough to cut, that's for sure. Not as tough as some of the Aussie hardwoods I've cut but right up there


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## MCW

BlueRider said:


> Be nice to know how it compares to all the Aussie super woods.



I can tell you now that it is tough to cut, that's for sure. Not as tough as some of the Aussie hardwoods I've cut but right up there


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## BlueRider

MCW said:


> I can tell you now that it is tough to cut, that's for sure. Not as tough as some of the Aussie hardwoods I've cut but right up there



I know too well how it will give a chain a work out, but so will macrocarpa and it has a pretty low number on the janka scale. we don't have any jarrah or any of the other nice stuff you have on this side of the equater so I am curious to know how Chinese elm compares to some of your stuff.


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## julian 1973

I had an American elm milled last year on a bandsaw mill and it was easily cut. I built a small solar kiln and put the wood in there after only air drying for two weeks. I dried the elm in 4 months during the cold midwestern winter months with almost no degrade and the boards all cut and planed out with no problems.


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## Treetom

Nice pics. Never thought the 'ol piss elm was much good for anything. Good luck, whatever you end up building.


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## MCW

BlueRider said:


> I know too well how it will give a chain a work out, but so will macrocarpa and it has a pretty low number on the janka scale. we don't have any jarrah or any of the other nice stuff you have on this side of the equater so I am curious to know how Chinese elm compares to some of your stuff.



We don't have Jarrah where I am but do have species like Red Gum, Pink Gum, Mallee and such. The hardest dead wood I have ever cut was an old River Box. It also had some termite dirt in it to make matters worse. I actually gave up as it took 3 chains to drop it then 1 chain per round. It was also the densest wood I have ever lifted - felt like lead.
I'm not sure if Chinese Elm is really tough as far as janka hardness etc but this is getting up there with the toughest green wood I've ever cut. Hard to explain as not tough as in "I can't hammer a nail into it" hard but just really difficult to cut. I have cut down a few green Eucalypts in people's yards that have been super tough like steel but the chain has never felt like it just wants to "bounce" out like in this Elm log


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## BobL

The few references I could find to Chinese Elm Janka *dry* hardness rates it between 1200 and 1350 lb which puts it in the area of White Oak, American Elm and American Beech. Just by way of comparison Hickory (pecan) is rated at 1820 lb Janka Harness.

Jarrah's dry hardness is 1910 lb but is considered soft compared to other Aussie hardwoods. At 1300 lb Janka green hardness, jarrah is the softest wood I usually get to mill. 

In comparison Spotted Gum is 2200, Queensland Box is around 3000 right up to stuff like Gidgee which is ~3800. 

My understanding about CS cutting is straight hardness is just one factor that affects cutting speed. Because CS cutting involves a considerable amount of fibre tearing, the fibre strength and elasticity are important. Timber Like Aussie Karri is not all that hard (2040 lb) but it has very high tensile strength fibres so cuts more like a 2500 hardness timber. In contrast some really hard woods are quite brittle and so do not feel as hard.

The other factor is silica uptake of the tree. The silica blunts chains quickly but is not reflected in the hardness. An example of that is a rare tree called Tuart. It has a Janka harness of 2500 lb but it can draw up so much silica that is feels like cutting stuff harder than Queensland Box. 

BTW here is an interesting table with a range of hardnesses although it contains only a few Aussie hardwoods. http://ejmas.com/tin/2009tin/tinart_goldstein_0904.html


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## stipes

sleddude5 said:


> I know that.
> 
> But I'll make something out of it, nothing I have goes to waste.
> 
> Jerry C



I'm with you...Beautiful grain,,and beats cutting it up into firewood..I see where if it does warp,,you can cut it up in short pieces,,and make alot of things with it still...


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## BlueRider

BobL said:


> The few references I could find to Chinese Elm Janka *dry* hardness rates it between 1200 and 1350 lb which puts it in the area of White Oak, American Elm and American Beech. Just by way of comparison Hickory (pecan) is rated at 1820 lb Janka Harness....
> 
> http://ejmas.com/tin/2009tin/tinart_goldstein_0904.html



This makes me think that something has been mistakenly identified. American elm (ulmas americana) is much softer than white oak but red elm (ulmas rubra) is comperable to white oak, also it is common for the picturesqe trees lineing many streest to be red elm yet most people think of them as iconic and therefore they must be american elms. The lumber from siberian elm (ulmas pumilia) looks almost exactly like red elm at a glance but it is slightly softer. this also leads to siberian elms often being confused with american elms. then there is the smell. all three smell like a barn yard when you cut them so tis leads to people calling all three piss elm... ahh latin is a wonderful tool.

in my experiance chinese elm (umas parvifolia) is much harder than either american elm or red elm and would be comperable to hickory in hardness. 

the part about the fiber strength is probably more relivant than janka hardness because it will determine how a wood will work relative to wood working. though I suppose it is truely a combinatin of the fiber strength and hardness that determine how suitable a particular woood is for making something like a chair. It is for this reason that I am partcularly fond of Chinese elm. It is very tough and has performed superior to hickory for me in use as a handle wood. when using it for furniture I can make parts with smaller cross section and not wory about them breaking or having excessive flex.


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## jlpoole

sleddude5 said:


> Yesterday I spent some quality time with my CSM and a hunk of chinese elm. <snip>



The wood you have photographed looks very much to be Siberian Elm (the burls of which are used in Bentleys and Rolls Royce), not Chinese elm. I had two Siberian Elms in our parkway and had them milled up. I'm going to be milling Chinese Elm for the first time next week. In Southern California, Chinese elm is considered a trash tree and highly invasive. I'll e interested to see if the heart wood of the trees I'll be milling will bear anything like their cousins Siberian Elm and American Elm.


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## qbilder

jlpoole said:


> The wood you have photographed looks very much to be Siberian Elm (the burls of which are used in Bentleys and Rolls Royce), not Chinese elm. I had two Siberian Elms in our parkway and had them milled up. I'm going to be milling Chinese Elm for the first time next week. In Southern California, Chinese elm is considered a trash tree and highly invasive. I'll e interested to see if the heart wood of the trees I'll be milling will bear anything like their cousins Siberian Elm and American Elm.



Lots of folks confuse Chinese & Siberian elm, or consider the two the same thing. To be honest, i'm not sure I would know the difference. I have Siberian elm that ranged from chocolate brown walnut color to a blonde similar to birch. Never know til you're in the log. Siberian elm is considered invasive here. I have no idea if Chinese elm is here or not, or if I could even tell the difference. 

There's an elm that I sometimes cut in Ohio that grows next to streams & in river bottoms. The old timers call it "piss elm" or "bobber elm" because it stinks and the bark is corky enough that it makes good fishing bobbers. It's a beautiful blood red when cut & milled, but turns gray as it dries.


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## jlpoole

qbilder said:


> i'm not sure I would know the difference.



It's the bark. The Siberian Elm has the thick pine-link bark, American Elm's is less thick, and the Chinese Elm has thin light colored bark which looks like Sycamore from a distance.


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## mikeb1079

i'm always curious when someone posts a casual response to a 4 year old thread. are they just randomly reading old posts? not that it's necessarily a bad thing, i just find it odd.


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## jlpoole

mikeb1079 said:


> i'm always curious when someone posts a casual response to a 4 year old thread. are they just randomly reading old posts? not that it's necessarily a bad thing, i just find it odd.



Well, I have milled several elms and Siberian Elm and I know Chinese Elm and the posting to this topic did not seem definitive, so i thought I'd contribute my experience to help someone distinguish the two. Adding to the knowledge base.


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## BlueRider

jlpoole said:


> The wood you have photographed looks very much to be Siberian Elm (the burls of which are used in Bentleys and Rolls Royce), not Chinese elm. I had two Siberian Elms in our parkway and had them milled up. I'm going to be milling Chinese Elm for the first time next week. In Southern California, Chinese elm is considered a trash tree and highly invasive. I'll e interested to see if the heart wood of the trees I'll be milling will bear anything like their cousins Siberian Elm and American Elm.



Sorry to say but you will likely be disapointed. Siberian undoubtably has the most stricking figure and color of the elms I have worked with. Chinese elm will have some subtle pink tones once dry but those are transient and the wood will turn to a medium tan/brown. This is not to say that its not worth milling or using in furniture. It is one of my favorite woods, and I have over 100 slabs of claro wlanut stacked outside my shop.

be sure to have some help on hand it is a LOT heavier than siberian elm.


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