Sweet Gum

[khaos]

I have 3 big gum trees in my yard. I am going to take them down leaving the hickory and Oaks. Is the gum a nice enough wood to bother milling and drying? The trees are in great shape I should get a lot of wood from them.

I haul away 3 pickup loads of gumballs twice a year!! It stops this year.:eek:

[Ajcoholic]

I do quite a bit of repair & restoration work, and gum seems to have been used a lot in older furniture. It is pretty decent wood, and not cheap if you want to buy it.

AJC

[mikek]

Joe, Sweet Gum can be real good looking wood. It may have good figure and color variations. If it doesn't warp and crack during drying it will be just fine. The stretchers on this old workbench are Sweet Gum. The bench is about 15 years old now. I also made a stool seat from this wood and a wagon for a grandkid. All are in good shape still.

[genek]

sweat gum is a very nice wood to work with... to help on spliting and warping coat the ends with a water sealer.. that is used on block in basement to stop water seapage. if you are going to air dry it get some heavy duty straps and bind it every two to three free. make sure you use stickers between each layer.. if you have a saw mill that kiln dries wood see what they would charge. i get my local saw mill broken stickers and i am able to cut the bad section out and use them..

[khaos]

Thanks all. I will come post the results when I get'm cut in summertime.