# Curly Maple



## Bennett-Valley (Mar 17, 2013)

Is there any way to tell if a maple is curly before it is milled out?


----------



## GoIrish (Jan 29, 2012)

I've tried and chickened out before I bought rough stock. I think you can see a difference planer pattern (tear out maybe) but I did not bring a little plane or scraper to verify. Guy at the mill thought it was curly too. Since they don't charge more for figured wood he had no reason to lie.


----------



## WillemJM (Aug 18, 2011)

Curly Maple is a little softer and the figure is very apparent on the quarter sawn parts, such as board edges.


----------



## Bennett-Valley (Mar 17, 2013)

What about price? I found a guy selling it at $5.00 per board foot beautiful stuff.


----------



## WillemJM (Aug 18, 2011)

ValleyBennett said:


> What about price? I found a guy selling it at $5.00 per board foot beautiful stuff.


It depends on the quality, with lots of figure and boards 7" wide and more, that will be a very good deal.


----------



## Allen Tomaszek (Dec 11, 2010)

You should be able to see the curl even in a rough sawn board. Sometimes there can be light curl that you might not see in a rough sawn piece that shows up when you plane the board but that would be light curl in my experience.


----------



## cw log&veneer (Mar 7, 2011)

if you peel back the bark you can see raised lines running around the log its pretty common around root flares , and around large knots on the log,but if you see it running up the log all the way around log thats the real curly stuff. you should never do this on standing trees as it can kill the tree. hope this helps


----------



## qbilder (Dec 19, 2010)

Peeling the bark sometimes works, and other times I have found curly figure when the outside trunk is smooth. As for seeing it in rough cut, that's a toss, too. If the curl is similar in width to the saw marks then it'll be very tough to see.

The way I find & sort curly is by cutting a 3" cookie from the ends of the log, and busting them open. If it's curly then the grain in the break will be wrinkled. You can see how tight and how deep the curl is from the cookies. When you see curl, you get a cookie from the opposite end of the log and compare. Sometimes the curl runs through the entire log & sometimes not.


----------



## Bennett-Valley (Mar 17, 2013)

Thanks guys that will help, I've been lied to by my loggers. Wish I would have caught it earlier.


----------



## qbilder (Dec 19, 2010)

Lied to? What did they tell you that was untrue?


----------



## cw log&veneer (Mar 7, 2011)

qbilder said:


> Peeling the bark sometimes works, and other times I have found curly figure when the outside trunk is smooth. As for seeing it in rough cut, that's a toss, too. If the curl is similar in width to the saw marks then it'll be very tough to see.
> 
> The way I find & sort curly is by cutting a 3" cookie from the ends of the log, and busting them open. If it's curly then the grain in the break will be wrinkled. You can see how tight and how deep the curl is from the cookies. When you see curl, you get a cookie from the opposite end of the log and compare. Sometimes the curl runs through the entire log & sometimes not.


 yep someone showed me that a while back, i had a big maple laying in the yard and he pointed it out to me, he saw it in the end of thelog i had forgot about that.


----------



## Bennett-Valley (Mar 17, 2013)

I was told you can only tell when it is milled out. Thanks guys


----------

