Family-Owned Hardwood Flooring Company
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Allegheny Mountain Hardwood Flooring is a family owned and operated business in the heart of the Appalachian Mountains. During the Great Depression Harry Hickman and his wife started the sawmill with a team of horses and cross cut saw. His son, Larry Hickman, continued the sawmill and also passionately spent time in the woods. Learning the best way to manage and harvest the trees to ensure the forests will be there for future generations. Today Denny Hickman and his children, Jessica and Jake are involved with the business. Manufacturing high quality Rift & Quarter Sawn flooring. This presentation shows a bit about our forest managment and explains the difference in how the logs are cut and how it effects the lumber and ultimately the flooring in your home.
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Family-Owned Hardwood Flooring Company
- 5. The Hickman Family is involved in the entire process of the flooring creation www.hickmanwoods.com
- 6. From the forest management www.hickmanwoods.com FSC certified in 1999
- 9. • Plain Sawn • Quarter Sawn • Rift Sawn • Live Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com
- 10. www.hickmanwoods.com Plain sawn Quarter sawn Rift sawn Live sawn Wood Flooring Cuts www.hickmanwoods.com
- 11. www.hickmanwoods.com • Series of Parallel Cuts • Remaining Cuts Perpendicular to First Set of Cuts • Produces Wider Boards than Rift and Quartered Wood • Boards Vary in Width www.hickmanwoods.com
- 12. Plain Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com • Board Face has “Cathedral” Grain Pattern • Contains Mostly Flat-Grain Wood with some Vertical-Grained Wood • End Grain has Annual Growth Rings Between 0-35 Degrees • Movement across the width of board • Least amount of stability www.hickmanwoods.com
- 13. Plain Sawn • Traditional Choice • Commodity product • Typically narrow Boards • Red Oak Most Common • Homes Built Early to Mid 1900s www.hickmanwoods.com
- 14. Plain Sawn vs. R&Q www.hickmanwoods.comwww.hickmanwoods.com
- 15. Quarter Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com • Quarter the Log • Perpendicular to Growth Rings • Vertical Grain & fleck www.hickmanwoods.com
- 16. www.hickmanwoods.com • Board Face has Fleck Pattern • Contains Tight Wavy Grain • End Grain has Annual Growth Rings 90 Degrees to Surface • Movement in the thickness of the board • Recommended for Radiant Heat • Great Option for STABILITY www.hickmanwoods.com Quarter Sawn
- 17. www.hickmanwoods.com • Vibrant Ray Flecks • Tight Wavy Grain • Flecks Caused by Medullary Rays – Pronounced in White Oak www.hickmanwoods.com Quarter Sawn
- 18. www.hickmanwoods.com • Quarter the Log • Remaining Cuts from Center Face and Work Out • Boards 45 Degrees to Growth Rings • Comes from Smaller / outside Part of Wedge • Hard to Produce Only Wide-Width Rift, which is why Sold with Quartered www.hickmanwoods.com
- 19. www.hickmanwoods.com • Board Face has Vertical Grain Pattern • Contains Minimal Fleck • End Grain has Annual Growth Rings 30 - 60 Degrees to Surface www.hickmanwoods.com
- 20. www.hickmanwoods.com • Similar to Quartersawn • Accentuated Vertical Grain • Minimal Fleck • Saw Angle Adjusted so Fewer Cuts Parallel to Medullary Rays • Produces More Waste www.hickmanwoods.com
- 21. Rift & Quarter Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com ClearNatural www.hickmanwoods.com
- 22. Live Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com • First Cut Straight Through Log at Center • All Remaining Cuts Parallel to First • Yields Very Wide Boards • Produces Very Little Waste www.hickmanwoods.com
- 23. Live Sawn www.hickmanwoods.com • Board Face Growth Rings Work Way Out from Parallel in Center to Perpendicular at Edges • End Grain has Annual Growth Rings 0-90 Degrees to Surface www.hickmanwoods.com
- 24. Live Sawn • Allows More Fleck Effect • Wider Planks Show More Knots Holes and Other Natural Characteristics • Rustic Look Increasingly Popular • Offered in White Oak • “French Oak” – same cut www.hickmanwoods.com
- 25. Live Sawn • Wider Boards • Random Widths • More Fleck • More Knot Holes & Other Character Marks • Natural Beauty Shows Through www.hickmanwoods.com
- 28. • Wood is Hygroscopic • Absorbs or Loses Moisture Based on Surrounding Environment • Swells When Gains Moisture • Shrinks When Loses Moisture • Moisture moves out of medullary rays • R&Q dries slower than PS www.hickmanwoods.com
- 29. • Expands and Contracts through Width • Less Dimensionally Stable • Expands and Contracts through Thickness • More Dimensionally Stable • Expands and Contracts through Thickness • More Dimensionally Stable Plainsawn Quartersawn Riftsawn www.hickmanwoods.com
- 30. • Dead Green RQ lumber (88%- 92% MC) can take almost 2 months in kiln to dry • Green lumber has 2 lbs / BF of water • Each board will lose 1/8” thickness in drying process www.hickmanwoods.com
- 31. • Not all Sawmills Set Up for Rift and Quartered Lumber • If Plain Sawn and R&Q Dried Together, Boards Will Not Dry Equally or Correctly • Different Moisture Contents Will Result • Will Impact Performance www.hickmanwoods.com
- 32. Moisture • Board Core Dries at Different Rate than Outside • Drying Plainsawn and R&Q Together Results in Different Drying Rates • Boards Could Warp, Cup, Twist or Bow • Must Constantly Monitor and Test Drying Process www.hickmanwoods.com
- 33. Allegheny Flooring Species • White Oak • Red Oak • Beech • Cherry • Hickory • Walnut • Ash, Hard Maple, Spaulded Maple, & Aspen Ceiling also available www.hickmanwoods.com
- 34. www.hickmanwoods.com American Beech • Known as “Mother of the Forest” for its nutrient- rich humus • Typically reaches 120’ high • Produce large amount of seeds • Soft smooth pliable grey bark • Like an Aspen, Beech trees are clone organisms
- 35. www.hickmanwoods.com Beech • Attractive and cool floor • Clear & Natural available • Rift & Quarter Sawn Available • Light toned • Strong and durable • Subtle straight grain with a close uniform texture • Janka 1300
- 37. www.hickmanwoods.com Cherry • Cherry belongs to the rose family. • Colonists used Cherry Tree for its fruit, medicinal properties, and home furnishings. • Easily identifiable by its very dark, thick, corn flake like bark. • Fruit is used in jam, pies, soda and ice cream. • Ave. height 60’ -80’ feet. • Beyond 80 – 100 years diameter growth slows, and mortality of cherry increases rapidly.
- 38. www.hickmanwoods.com Cherry • Cherry is Fine Grained • Wood has a fine uniform, straight grain, satiny, smooth texture. • The heartwood varies from a rich red to reddish brown and hues will darken with age on exposure to light • Sapwood is creamy white. • Often used as a border along with an oak or hickory floor • Softer floor – will ding easily • Janka – 995
- 39. www.hickmanwoods.com Hickory • Grows to 80-90 ft. • Nuts are edible & tasty • Hickory nuts were used for cooking oil and to repel mosquitoes by the Native Americans • Does not start producing seeds until 40 years old • Shagbark hickory is easily identified in the woods due to it’s shaggy bark.
- 40. www.hickmanwoods.com Hickory • A tough, beautiful floor full of character • Great floor for kitchens, high traffic areas, and families! • contrasting color tones come through from the lighter blonde sapwood and darker brown heartwood to create a very interesting pattern from board to board. • Hardest Native Species • Janka 1850
- 41. www.hickmanwoods.com Walnut • Attaining heights of 100 -130 ft. • Valued for its edible nuts. • From the time of ancient Greeks until modern European history, Walnuts symbolized fertility and were strewn at weddings. • Scratching the shell of the nut creates a wonderful citrus aroma • Walnut’s lifespan is only approximately 120 years
- 42. www.hickmanwoods.com Walnut • Matures to a rich warm color • Beautiful without a stain • Wavy grain that produces an attractive and decorative figure • Natural grade will have creamy white sap wood • Heartwood is light brown to dark chocolate brown. • Tough hardwood of medium density, has more potential for dings than hickory or oak. • Janka 1000
- 43. www.hickmanwoods.com Red Oak • PA grows great Red Oaks • Oaks are key in America’s history • One of the largest and most important timber trees • Ave. height 80’ • 20” – 40” diameter • begins to bear fruit at about age 25 but usually does not produce seeds abundantly until about age 50
- 44. www.hickmanwoods.com Red Oak • Classic Hardwood Floor • Beautiful Grain • Rift & Quarter Sawn Available • Clear & Natural Grades • Natural grade allows for color variation along with knots • dense type of hardwood so it is more resistant to regular wear • World Renown for it’s quality • Sapwood is white to light brown and the heartwood is a pinkish reddish brown • Janka - 1280
- 45. White Oak www.hickmanwoods.com • Native to Eastern USA • Great Strength • Tall strong powerful looking tree • Bark is a light grey color • Deer & Animals love the acorns and small saplings for food • average height– 65’-80’ high, • 36” – 48”diameter
- 46. www.hickmanwoods.com White Oak • Classic Flooring with a diverse range of possibilities • Rift & Quarter Sawn Available • Beautiful Grain Patterns • Quarter Sawn shows magnificent fleck character • Clear or Natural Grades • The Original Allegheny LIVE SAWN • Looks amazing in modern homes to traditional homes • Takes color stain very well • Great floor for Pets! • Janka - 1330
- 49. R&Q White Oak Herringbone www.hickmanwoods.comwww.hickmanwoods.com
- 54. Direct From the Source www.hickmanwoods.com Check out our website for more pictures and information
Editor's Notes
- There are four cuts from which wood flooring is made. Three are well-known and established in the industry, and one is relatively new. The most popular cut for wood flooring is plainsawn. This also is sometimes referred to as flatsawn, but both terms mean the same thing. The other two well-known cuts are quartersawn and riftsawn. These are entirely different cuts, but they often are sold together as rift and quartered wood. A new fourth trend that is just emerging is livesawn wood. It is a mix of rift and quartered wood along with plainsawn wood. This sounds easy enough, but to fully understand livesawn wood, it is important to first have an understanding of plainsawn, quartersawn and riftsawn wood, and how they each differ.
- When most people think of wood floors, they tend to think of a traditional 2- to 3-inch plainsawn red oak floor, like in this photo. That’s because most old homes built in the early to mid-1900s had this type of floor. This type of wood is cut from the tree in a distinct way, which gives it a different look than rift, quartered or livesawn wood. Let’s take a look at that process.
- Livesawn wood allows for more fleck effect in the boards, while the wider planks allow for more knot holes and other natural characteristics, including saw blade marks, to show. This natural look is becoming increasingly popular in today’s market.
- This photo shows the details of livesawn wood with wider, random width boards, more fleck, more knot holes and other character marks, and prominent saw blade marks on the face of the wood. As you can see, it’s a beautiful product that let’s the natural characteristics of the wood show through.
- Wood is a hygroscopic material, which means that it absorbs and loses moisture in accordance with the moisture of the surrounding environment. When it gains moisture, wood swells. When it loses moisture, wood shrinks. The direction of the movement is determined by the annual growth rings.
- You will remember from earlier in this session that where the annual growth rings appear on wood flooring is different depending on the cut of the wood. Because of this, the wood performs differently. Plainsawn wood will expand and contract through the width of the board as shown in this illustration. The wider the plank, the more potential movement. Unlike plainsawn wood, quartersawn and riftsawn wood have movement through the thickness of the board, which means they can gain or lose thickness based on the environment. Because they move based on their thickness as opposed to their width, quartersawn and riftsawn wood experience less movement and have more dimensional stability.
- This photo shows wood sitting in a kiln about to start the drying process. The amount of time wood must dry depends on its species and its cut. Moisture, which we’ve already discussed, moves out of lumber through the medullary rays. In plainsawn wood, the medullary rays are perpendicular to the surface, so moisture moves out through the thickness of the wood. In a 4/4-inch piece of lumber, moisture from the center only has to move ½ inch from the center out of the board, allowing the lumber to dry more quickly than a quartersawn piece of lumber. Moisture in a 4/4-by-6-inch quartersawn board has to move 3 inches from the center, which means it takes longer to dry.
- Unfortunately, not all sawmills are set up to cut specifically for rift and quartered lumber. If plainsawn boards and rift and quartered boards are all dried in a kiln together, the boards will not be dried equally or correctly. The result is that they will end up with different moisture content levels, which will impact performance.
- The core of a board dries at a different rate than the outside of a board. Drying plainsawn and rift and quartered wood together will result in different drying rates and potentially warped, cupped, twisted or bowed boards. This is why it is important to constantly monitor the drying process, and to conduct testing throughout the drying process as well.