How do you straighten a warped piece of wood?

[LFS19]

I edge glued two pieces of wood, and after leaving to dry, I noticed one of the two pieces I've glued has warped.
Not on the glue line or around that area, so the joint isn't weak; but in the middle of one of the pieces there's a banana.
The wood is pine, if that makes a difference.

I was wondering if anyone had any tips on how I could sort this out?

Thanks allot

 

[Jacob]

Plane.

 

[AndyT]

There are many different answers to your question so it's impossible to be specific, but consider the following:

Choose your wood to minimise warping (so pay attention to growth pattern, seasoning, conversion, species, storage and grain direction).
Constrain thin wood within a thicker frame.
Fix strong battens to the back.
Plane your warped wood to make it straight (but thinner).
Cut grooves on the back and glue in wedges to bend it the other way.
Selectively wet one or the other face.

Or just replace it!

 

[MattRoberts]

It kind of depends how bad the banana is. You could cut and re-join but keep the boards flat during the glue up, or plane as Jacob suggests

 

[custard]

You'll hear lots of things like dampening just the concave side and leaving to dry, applying a hair dryer to the convex side, clamping flat, etc etc. But the truth is they're all last ditch, desperate measures with only a very low probability of success.

Producing relatively flat and stable work really depends on the work you do at the very early stages of a project. Picking boards at the timber yard that are straight grained and closer to quarter sawn, ensuring the timber has had adequate time to dry out, machining down to final dimensions in small steps, and always storing your timber and components so that air can circulate around all sides.

Softwoods are generally speaking very stable once they're dry, but move and warp like crazy during the drying process. So it sounds to me like you're working with pine that isn't adequately dry all the way through. That's very common by the way, softwoods are rarely kilned as far down as hardwoods and are frequently stored outside in the distribution chain. I don't work that much with softwoods for furniture making, the main use being Cedar for drawer bottoms, but when I do I'm very choosy at the buying stage and store it in stick in the workshop for literally months before using it.

 

[LFS19]

Plane.

I did - it warped after I'd planed and glued up.
Thanks

 

[LFS19]

There are many different answers to your question so it's impossible to be specific, but consider the following:

Choose your wood to minimise warping (so pay attention to growth pattern, seasoning, conversion, species, storage and grain direction).
Constrain thin wood within a thicker frame.
Fix strong battens to the back.
Plane your warped wood to make it straight (but thinner).
Cut grooves on the back and glue in wedges to bend it the other way.
Selectively wet one or the other face.

Or just replace it!

I'll bare that in mind, thanks for the tips.

 

[LFS19]

It kind of depends how bad the banana is. You could cut and re-join but keep the boards flat during the glue up, or plane as Jacob suggests

It's fairly prominent, not crazy though.
Maybe I should just re-do it, then
Thanks for the tips

 

[LFS19]

You'll hear lots of things like dampening just the concave side and leaving to dry, applying a hair dryer to the convex side, clamping flat, etc etc. But the truth is they're all last ditch, desperate measures with only a very low probability of success.

Producing relatively flat and stable work really depends on the work you do at the very early stages of a project. Picking boards at the timber yard that are straight grained and closer to quarter sawn, ensuring the timber has had adequate time to dry out, machining down to final dimensions in small steps, and always storing your timber and components so that air can circulate around all sides.

Softwoods are generally speaking very stable once they're dry, but move and warp like crazy during the drying process. So it sounds to me like you're working with pine that isn't adequately dry all the way through. That's very common by the way, softwoods are rarely kilned as far down as hardwoods and are frequently stored outside in the distribution chain. I don't work that much with softwoods for furniture making, the main use being Cedar for drawer bottoms, but when I do I'm very choosy at the buying stage and store it in stick in the workshop for literally months before using it.

Ah, well that likely my problem, then.
I think I best just start over then, really.

In terms of choosing wood, I'll bare what you've said in mind next time I go to the lumber yard.
To tell you the truth, I often can't afford to go to the lumber yard, which might be where allot of my problems come from, haha

I spend over half my time trying to plane pallet wood, so I hardly do myself any favours with all this.
The problem is, having only been doing this for 6 months I have a LOT to learn.
So going to the lumber yard and buying wood everytime I want to practice my joints, would just be too costly (considering you're going to get it wrong a hundred times before you get it right)

Thanks for the advice

 

[AJB Temple]

Honestly - you really must not gets wrong lots of times before you get it right. I realise it was a throw away line, but people do this so much: instead of working slowly and methodically to get things right at the outset, they accept that they will make lots of mistakes.

Years ago I spent a lot of time doing a piano performance diploma, and my teacher was an exceptionally good Russian pianist called Evgenia Startseva. The Russian musicians are brought up with an enormously tough workload. She drummed into me from day 1, "however slow you go, get it absolutely right first time" "if you don't do that, all you are practising is your mistakes". I applied this philosophy to everything after that. Including woodwork.

 

[lurker]

There are no lumber yards this side of the Atlantic :wink:

 

[Ttrees]

I spend over half my time trying to plane pallet wood, so I hardly do myself any favours with all this.
The problem is, having only been doing this for 6 months I have a LOT to learn.
So going to the lumber yard and buying wood everytime I want to practice my joints, would just be too costly (considering you're going to get it wrong a hundred times before you get it right)

Pine pallet wood ......no thanks
try scavenging some hardwood doors, frames and windows
id rather buy tools instead of going to look for quartersawn pine .
You'd be surprised how much it adds up
Good Luck

 

[LFS19]

Honestly - you really must not gets wrong lots of times before you get it right. I realise it was a throw away line, but people do this so much: instead of working slowly and methodically to get things right at the outset, they accept that they will make lots of mistakes.

Years ago I spent a lot of time doing a piano performance diploma, and my teacher was an exceptionally good Russian pianist called Evgenia Startseva. The Russian musicians are brought up with an enormously tough workload. She drummed into me from day 1, "however slow you go, get it absolutely right first time" "if you don't do that, all you are practising is your mistakes". I applied this philosophy to everything after that. Including woodwork.

I couldn't agree more.
I thought I was working slowly to be honest; I guess I can always take more time, though.

Considering I'm also a pianist that was told the same thing, you'd think I'd have already applied it properly with wood work, haha

Thanks for the advice

 

[LFS19]

There are no lumber yards this side of the Atlantic :wink:

Sorry; too many US woodwork books I guess

 

[LFS19]

I spend over half my time trying to plane pallet wood, so I hardly do myself any favours with all this.
The problem is, having only been doing this for 6 months I have a LOT to learn.
So going to the lumber yard and buying wood everytime I want to practice my joints, would just be too costly (considering you're going to get it wrong a hundred times before you get it right)

Pine pallet wood ......no thanks
try scavenging some hardwood doors, frames and windows
id rather buy tools instead of going to look for quartersawn pine .
You'd be surprised how much it adds up
Good Luck

i'd jump at the chance if I could find any.
Where would you look?

thanks

 

[LFS19]

Is there anything inherently wrong with pallet pine? Or is it just the laborious nature of pulling the pallet apart and planing all the wood?

 

[Ttrees]

The best bet is if you can find hotels and nightclubs changing hands ....fancy small bits
But for aroca or something like it its usually houses that are getting done up around town ..
Good time to go lookin would be a month onward before some large event ..
Keep at this and you will eventually find the motherload someday
That pic was before i filled the workshop (hammer)
and i've just about now got through the rest of it .
Got a metal detector on ebay following a thread here a while ago
Id say the neighborhood is wondering where all the strange beeping is coming from ..
One of the handiest things ive bought yet
Good luck

 

[Racers]

Its the cheapest stuff that is no good for anything else, apart from that its o/k.

You need to keep a look out for stuff being thrown out of freecycle etc for old chests of draws wardrobes etc anything with real wood in.

Pete

 

[Jacob]

Honestly - you really must not gets wrong lots of times before you get it right. I realise it was a throw away line, but people do this so much: instead of working slowly and methodically to get things right at the outset, they accept that they will make lots of mistakes.

Years ago I spent a lot of time doing a piano performance diploma, and my teacher was an exceptionally good Russian pianist called Evgenia Startseva. The Russian musicians are brought up with an enormously tough workload. She drummed into me from day 1, "however slow you go, get it absolutely right first time" "if you don't do that, all you are practising is your mistakes". I applied this philosophy to everything after that. Including woodwork.

Yep.
When I started my C&G course some years ago I was totalcrap at first project - making half housing joints from bits of 2x1". I just kept on repeating it until it the results were passable. I made enough little crosses to kit out a very large pet's cemetery. They were getting better towards the end!
Oddly enough I'm now looking at music and see it as a very similar craft process. The reason I couldn't play anything much for many years is because it was all too difficult and I should have been sticking with the simple stuff. No shame in doing Baa Baa Black sheep up each string - in fact a bloody good exercise. Followed by "Happy Birthday" "The First Noel" etc etc. They may laugh but take no notice!

 

[Jacob]

Is there anything inherently wrong with pallet pine? Or is it just the laborious nature of pulling the pallet apart and planing all the wood?

Not at all but you most likely can't make "fine" furniture out of it - unless you hit on a very good pallet!
It's good exercise and you can waste a lot of free wood getting your techniques sorted out.
Even better if you have a woodburner!