Great video! I'm a tree farmer in the midwest and grow white oak (quercus alba) and several different red oak species that are sold in the "red oak" group. Red oak is easier to grow, for sure. I can grow about 3x more lumber of red oak as white oak on the same acre. Plus now the bourbon/wine barrel industry is after white oak logs, few good white oak logs are going to general sawmills. White oak likes lots of prescribed fire at certain points of its lifespan and grows much slower, it's just more difficult to manage than red oak. I do love the smell of the chainsaw's woodchips from a big white oak during harvest, there's no comparison to red oak in terms of aroma. Thanks again.
Thanks, For the information ladies. I have been using red oak for 20 plus years and never considered it's usage as a dovetail drawer until recently and I was unaware that it is not a good fit for dovetailing. I have had very good results using red oak for cabinet faces with both dark , light stains and glaze paints for grain look.
I'm building mug trees out of red oak. I love it! it's easy to cut (or miscut, as I did with one part tonight), and it looks great with stain and clear coat, or just a clear coat. I might even try a coat of Old English to see how that works.
This is good stuff. I teach woodturning and will add your site to my list of recommended sources. The wood species I'd personally like to learn more about is maple. There are SO MANY types of maple, plus it has a tendency to spalt and contain figure, that I think we'd all like to hear your insights.
Good info. One of my first projects years ago was a red oak top for a cabinet. After I stained it I noticed these little stain spots kept coming to the top, would wipe them off and an hour later they were back. Drove me nuts. Even re-sanded and still kept coming up. Set it aside for a couple of weeks and started over, this time using a stain blocker, problem solved. Have never used red oak again.
Thank you so much for this video! Now I know what kind of oak I have on my floors. It’s original 1951 Parque three-quarter inch tongue and groove. I was wondering how light I can stain my floor. Do you have any idea? I saw someone that said that they mixed a little white in their stain. I have no idea what they meant by that.
Yall are funny, every comment you made seems to sway the customer towards white oak at 2-3x the price. Anyways, red oak is entirely an unbroken open pore end grain as you correctly demonstrated by blowing blows through the dowel. White oak does have an open pore end grain but the pores are smaller, less numerous and most importantly the open pores on the end grain are intermittently open & closed thus water has a much harder time traveling via capillary action. I also suspect tanin content is much higher in white oak and live oak as bugs and fungus don't seem to bother the heartwood. If you think white oak has something to brag on, you should see some straight grained quatersawn live oak. Yall two women are killing it, keep it up.
I was told that, the term red & white oak, is derived not from the timbers colour, but from the colour of its foliage. What is your opinion on this, please?
You speak of the holes in the red oak as if they don't exist in the white oak yet they do. Can this perhaps be explained differently and better? To me - both having holes - it's that the holes in the red are disorganized looking where, in the white, they are VERY organized looking.
Black oak (quercus velutina) is sold as "red oak". Of the major red oak species sold as red oak, black oak is one of the better ones. The best species are northern red oak and cherrybark oak, in my opinion, but black oak is pretty darned close. Black oak grows slower than northern red or cherrybark, I think it has better grain pattern and quartersaws better because of that. Just my opinion, I'm a tree farmer who grows white oak, red oak species, and a few others. Thanks!
"So" this is a pet peeve of mine. It has become a thing and is only getting worse/more common over time. I believe it makes the user think they sound more authoritive or in command of their subject but to my ears it sounds utterly ridiculous especially when used over and over again by the same person in the same discussion.
Carla, will you marry me? ;) White Oak is so incredibly superior to Red Oak is isn't funny. I have cutter heads and quarter sawn table tops to prove it!
