I chanced upon an impressively large American beech plank the other day. This twenty foot long board came from a tree that was nearly 200 years old, was 36″ wide, and just over 2 1/2″ thick.
Needless to say, it went home with me. Not in one piece, mind you, as I have no use for a piece of wood that long, let alone the means of moving and storing it. Since it was destined to be used in smaller pieces, I cut it into 36″ lengths and stuffed it into my car.
Some quick calculations showed that this amount of beech is a many year supply of saw handles for me, so I decided to cut it into plane billets and saw handle blanks and offer it for sale. Depending on demand, this may be a limited time offer; if there is sufficient interest, I will put the time into tracking down and developing a reliable supply.
Quartersawn American beech molding plane billets (and a couple of wedges up on top of the pile).
Quartersawn American beech smooth and jack plane billets.
Quartersawn American beech saw handle blanks for backsaws and handsaws.
I finally got around to getting my 14″ Walker Turner bandsaw running.
Part of the results from a day of resawing. It seemed like a lot more than this when I was in the middle of a pile of sawdust.
Excellent! Great score and that make for plenty of great products.