English Oak Board Flattening Day

English Oak Board Flattening Day The Lucas Mill is a fine circular saw mill and will cut up to 10" wide boards at a fair rate, however, it also doubles up as a superb board planer with the addition of a 280mm diameter carbide tipped cutter block. Using it as a sawmill we first cut this large spalted beech to give us a datum plinth to mount our large kiln dried boards on. The saw blade is then swapped for the planing block. The boards we were flattening were from the Barbon Estate near Kirkby Lonsdale and had originally been cut on site due to the logistics of moving one very large oak log. This 250-year-old tree was cut into 100mm x 2400mm sections with some boards over a metre wide. These were then air dried for over two years and kilned for a further three months, resulting in a moisture content of around 10% - perfect for a large indoor table. To get rid of any twist, the positioning of the boards is crucial to keep them as thick as possible. Typically a 100mm thick waney-edged slab would finish at 70mm once fully planed and flattened. We managed an accuracy of better than 1mm end-to-end on the largest of the boards, and after a few hours sanding and smoothing of the edges, the results were stunning. We have several amazing boards for sale right now and more coming out from the kiln shortly. For more information call us on 01535 637755 or email us at sales@britishhardwoods.co.uk

For more information on English Oak Board Flattening Day talk to British Hardwoods, The Oak Specialists