s Which wood to use?

Which wood to use?

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From: Gordon Pratt

I visited your site shortly after deciding to build a cedar strip canoe. .... Having decided to go ahead I set about trying to find a source of Western Red Cedar in England - impossible - the only current use for cedar in England is greenhouses for which short lengths of poor quality timber seem the norm. To cut a long story short what are your views on using Silver ( or Sitka ) Spruce instead? It is a little heavier, much stronger, coarser grained, used in the boat building industry for masts and is about four times as expensive at $96 per cubic foot. However it is available, well seasoned and in 18ft lengths.

Gordon,

At the site of Lennart Sternkvist he mentions pine, cedar, spruce, and abachi, a wood I am not familiar with. He is Swedish, and may have more knowledge of European woods. When you get to his site, you can get his e-mail address and ask him questions. Other than that, I have used Sitka spruce and enjoyed its strength. It is an excellent wood for canoes. I prefer cedar not only for its lighter weight, but also its variation in color.

I have also been asked about Cypress and aromatic cedar. Cypress is virtually the same as Port Orford Cedar and is a suitable wood, and aromatic cedar would probably be OK, although I am not familiar with it. The best test is to cut several 1/4" strips from a few different boards of each wood, cut those strips to equal lengths of about two feet each, and then weigh them on a postage scale. Then physically break them with your hands and see if there is any significant difference in how tough they are. This kind of hands-on experimenting is better than any theoretical knowledge.

Happy paddling, David

Person paddling solo in a long, graceful woodstrip canoe

J Michael Bryan built this 68 lb, 34 inch beam by 17-1/2 foot long Micmac out of Redwood,
for fly-fishing for Blue-gill and Croppy on the lakes around Oklahoma with his wife.


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[?]   If you have a question about woodstrip canoes, send me an e-mail (details at the bottom of this page), and I'll try my best to answer. If you don't get a reply right away, it means I'm on vacation and will write as soon as I return.

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*   The Stripper's Guide to Canoe-building  by David Hazen is available from:

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