Question About Beechwood And Longbranch

[Seaspriter]

Here is a shot of the forestock... First thought was Beech.

Attachment 61445

David, you got it right. That's Beech. She's a beauty. Something about the wood give me the sense its Korean War MkII vintage.

BTW, after maple, birch, and beech are stained and finished and aged, depending upon the cut of the wood, it can be very difficult to distinguish the three, unless you look at the wood from angles. I have a Savage Stevens that's been Factory Repaired after D-Day. It has all four woods: walnut butt, beech lower hand-guard, birch upper hand-guard, and a forend that sure looks more like maple than birch (which it's expected to be). Also, I have maple in guns that have very fine cross-flecks that resemble beech cross-flecks, but the maple cross-flecking is always much less pronounced, but it can confuse even a trained eye. So don't be uptight if you confuse maple, beech, and birch -- there are some grades/cuts of the woods that can disguise themselves to look almost like the other.

BTW again, of course the Australians will legitimately say: "You forgot Coachwood!" which was used in the WWII No.1 MkIII guns from down under. Coachwood is a different breed of wood altogether. For the North American eye, coachwood has a more naturally "tan" color, is very close-grained like maple, and tends to resemble a darker shade of linden or bass wood. Hope that helps someone.

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[rgg_7]

The stock pictured is definitely "Birch". LB used walnut, yellow birch (with and without dye) and maple. I've never seen LB produced "beech" however lots of Brit "Beech" on FTR LB's. Ron (Canada)

[Peter Laidler]

Glad you said that too RGG. I've seen a lot of the light woods on the No5's, 4's and L1A1's etc etc and while I'm no expert by any stretch of the imagination, that photo just looked like birch to me, albeit a little yellow - which I puit down to age and treatment. I wish I could find the words that our woodworking instructors (Mr Duffield and Reilly) usaed to use to illustrate each.......

[SpikeDD]

Thank you all for your input. I was skeptical enough so, I asked. Beautiful wood for sure, Perhaps CODFan would like to sell me his butt?? ;-)

[Seaspriter]

Perhaps a few visual pictures from the Woodworkers Association might help unscramble the wood identification conundrums:

Walnut: http://www.woodworking.org/WC/Woods/161.html
Birch: http://www.woodworking.org/WC/Woods/030.html
Beech: http://www.woodworking.org/WC/Woods/020.html
Maple: http://www.woodworking.org/WC/Woods/125.html

Remember, what the wood looks like in real life depends very much on how it's cut relative to the grain, and how it's been stained.

Hope this helps.

[Peter Laidler]

You're right of course SS. I was thinking of a reply but your last sentence really does sum it up. A GOOD example of this was a friend wanted to replace some oak flooring. Took some large sections to the carpenters shop nearby to have it cut into planks and then into the flooring sections. When it came back it didn't even remotely match what he'd laid earlier. Because they'd sawn and planed the wood from the same original trunk section but using a different 'cut'.......

[Seaspriter]

You're right of course SS. I was thinking of a reply but your last sentence really does sum it up. A GOOD example of this was a friend wanted to replace some oak flooring. Took some large sections to the carpenters shop nearby to have it cut into planks and then into the flooring sections. When it came back it didn't even remotely match what he'd laid earlier. Because they'd sawn and planed the wood from the same original trunk section but using a different 'cut'.......

And multiply that consternation with the different types of woods within a species -- white or red birch? white or red oak or English brown oak? or African or Honduran Mahogany (Philippine mahogany is not a real mahogany), etc. -- and then the woodworker will typically quarter-saw a plank leaving a tight grain while the carpenter will live-saw a plank getting the widest board possible, with two totally different appearances. No wonder the amateur woodworker can get confused.

[breakeyp]

I always get it wrong in identifying wood until I bought a book called, "What Wood is it." It has actual samples of the wood bound in the book.

[SpikeDD]

When CODfan posted a pic of his buttstock, I saw it was a perfect match for the forestock and handguards I had. I private messaged him and he agreed to sell the buttstock to me. Thank you CODfan, I am extremely happy with the complete set of LB marked wood now. I don't have anything to put in it but who knows what the future holds.

The complete stock and shots of the wood that confused my amateur wood eyes. A nicely done patch as well, that I'm sure Peter will approve of.

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[CODFan]

Nice match.

Looks good!