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Finishing /Storing Green Hemlock Outside

Started by Wallenengineering, March 20, 2010, 10:37:00 AM

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Wallenengineering

Hello everyone. We have started to cut our first frame for a 1500 sf cape style home with garage. We are more than excited with our project. We purchased green, rough sawn hemlock from a mill down the road, and started last week with the garage rafters. We set our hand planer to remove only a slight amount of rough material, so some of the saw mill marks are still visible. Then we are chamfering the edges with a hand plane so the wood is friendly to the hand, but still "rustic" looking. We are cutting our frame inside a barn that we pole framed last year and quickly finding that we are going to run out of room in the pole barn. We will have to move some finished components outside until raising day. We hope to be ready by June/July.
We want to protect the finished materials from turning gray, and have been told this will happen pretty quickly with hemlock outside. We would like to "pre finish" the material before raising the frame, preferably before stacking outside, but have no experience finishing green wood. We were thinking of linseed oil, but would consider anything that will prevent the graying process. We are looking for the final color to end up slightly darker than the natural hemlock.
Would anyone enlighten us to what causes the wood to turn gray, and what we may do to protect the green frame pieces from turning outside? It is quite green still, and it will need to be stickered to allow drying. Would covering with a piece of metal siding, then loosly wrapping with breathable housewrap like tyvek work? Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks again for all the help we have received from this forum.

bigshow

The sun is gonna turn it gray.  I spent two years trying to keep my white pine covered up with tarps - it not easy, a constant battle.  I finally got a banding machine, banded the tarps to the timber piles.  I kept my timbers stickered and stacked on an east/west axis..I think i would've had less surface area exposed to the long summer sun if I had stored North/South.

It took me 2 months to pre assemble and raise my frame - at which time, pieces were increasingly not tarped.  And it weathered as gray as though it had been out for 2 years.  It doesnt take long.  I am going back and sanding my frame to spiff it up.  Just my experience....

In hindsight,  I would've built my garage first, got it decked and roofed..and stored all my timbers under that roof.  That was my original plan..I dont know why I strayed from it.
I never try anything, I just do it.

logman

I bought a 1000' roll of lumber wrap to keep my timbers covered.  It's cheaper than Tyvek and you can nail it to the ends of your timbers which you may not want to do with tarps.  It's also supposed to keep your timbers from getting mildew.
LT40HD, 12' ext, 5105 JD tractor, Genie GTH5519 telehandler
M&K Timber Works

Brad_bb

A lot of timber framers use and like Landark oil.  I think it's a combo of boiled linseed, citrus etc.. I haven't had a chance to try it yet. 
   The sun is the main cause of the graying.  If you can keep them out of the sun/light...  I have some whole spruce trees that were windblown over roots and all in summer 07 in a storm.  I peeled them and dragged them into one of my sheds that stays dark.  The first week they started molding from the wet sap.  I sprayed them with a 10 percent bleach solution and it took all the mold/mildew off - totally clean.  They've been in the dark shed since then and the color still looks the same as it did. Same goes for my other sawn wood.  Keep it out of the light and it seems to keep it from graying.  I'm not sure how much the finish will help keep from graying, but it must to some extent as the timbers in peoples homes don't seem to gray much from the light coming in the windows.
Anything someone can design, I can sure figure out how to fix!
If I say it\\\\\\\'s going to take so long, multiply that by at least 3!

frwinks

x2 on keeping everything out of the sun.  I have some 2 year old sawn EWP timbers that sat outside covered and never grey'ed .  Steel roofing/siding panels work great and the tyvek or lumber wrap will allow them to breath better than a tarp would.
I'm using a 50/50 mix linseed oil and turpentine on EWP and green hemlock.  It leaves the wood looking natural with good penetration


now let's see some pics of this frame... 8)

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