Wood I.D.

[Ted Jay]

I have one board, that I can't I.D.
The way it cuts reminds me of cedar and it's lightweight just like cedar. The shavings, to me, have a sweet kinda smell like Jasmine, but the wife says to her it's more of a medicine smell. Any ideas?

[packerguy®]

Camphor.

[Gregory of Sherwood Forest]

Yeah, if it's a strong smell, then camphor. It could also be Spanish Cedar, but that would be a much fainter smell.

[Ted Jay]

It doesn't remind of Cedar at all. When I had it on the jointer there was a strong smell but I couldn't pinpoint it to a Cedar smell. It was strong though... So Camphor it is.
This was in a batch of free wood a co-worker had given me when he moved into his new house last year. I bagged some of the shavings in a ziplock bag from when I was hand planing the other side in the last pic, so I'll ask my co-worker what it is.

[Dave Diaman]

packerguy® said:

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Camphor.

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Camphor has a really strong Vics Salve smell. I had to resaw a bunch of it for a silver chest I built and my head was clear for a good month. The smell is VERY VERY strong. Every time I turned my dust collector on for at least 6 weeks my whole shop smelled like Vics. I ended up replacing my filters to get rid of the smell because I couldn't clean the dust out.

[houblon]

Would Sassafras be an option?

[oakey]

houblon said:

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Would Sassafras be an option?

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sassafras is about that color
BUT any I have seen has a much different grain pattern and smells like sassafras rootbeerish while been cut

[packerguy®]

oakey said:

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[blockquote]houblon said:

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Would Sassafras be an option?

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sassafras is about that color
BUT any I have seen has a much different grain pattern and smells like sassafras rootbeerish while been cut

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[/blockquote]

Agreed.

Sassafrass looks more like Ash or Butternut than this photo. Open grained like Red Oak. Also, nothing medicine smelling about it either. Root beer is right on.

[houblon]

packerguy® said:

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Agreed.

Sassafrass looks more like Ash or Butternut than this photo. Open grained like Red Oak. Also, nothing medicine smelling about it either. Root beer is right on.

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I did not grow up with the stuff, for me root beer smells like medicine
But you are right, I recently made a frame out of sassafras and the figure reminded me of oak or ash.

[JustinTyson]

Western red cedar