spruce wood in the Wright aircrafts

This is good what PBS is doing in teaching us about the Wright
brothers history. One almost wonders whether being bicycle mechanics
was the prefered mechanical route to becoming the first builders of
airplanes. I would hazard the guess that in the cosmos where and if
intelligent life exists say 100 such exoplanets that all 100 built
their first airplanes from the individuals who built bicycles or had
bicycle training. And that all 100 exoplanets had to have bicycle
technology in existence before they could build their first airplane.
Further, I would speculate that all 100 such exoplanets when they
built their first airplane such as the Wright's on Earth that all 100
were within 50 years of their first big war which we call WW1. In
other words all 100 planets had to have a population large enough to
build bicycles and to build their first airplane such that they were
overpopulated and would soon have to engage in a World War on their
planet to relieve their overpopulations. But I stray too far. Such is
the trouble with a man who has so many theories that the minute I talk
about one theory I soon am obliged to romp into other theories.

I wanted to talk about spruce wood and how important it was in the
Wright aircraft.

Question: were the planes in WW1 made of wood? Was it spruce wood? Was
the German ace of Red Baron a wooden plane?

I love the superiority list of woods. Some say that hickory has the
highest tensile strength and some say ash, as per baseball bats. I
seem to think that ash beats hickory but am not set up to prove it.

I did notice one means of testing in the growth of trees themselves.
Because oak trees can throw a limb, a big limb at that to nearly
parallel the ground so the wood has to be extraordinarily tough to
hold a massive limb parallel to the ground. So oak must be strong and
tough. But Hickory or Ash seem not able to parallel the ground
indicating to me that oak is superior in strength than Hickory or Ash.
Perhaps not tensile-strength but some sort of other strength.

I suppose if Oak were lighther than Spruce that the Wright Brothers
would have prefered oak. I know that spruce has a dense foliage and so
its root and wood system must be special in order to stand upright in
those Colorado wind gales. So the Spruce wood must be strong to
withstand the wind but must be light because it is a soft wood. And
the canopy needle cover of spruce is so dense that you cannot see
through it so the wood must be strong to hold the tree upright and
stronger than pines.

I believe the science of botany should appoint a team of experts on
wood with the collobaration of physicists and engineers to make a
encyclopedic analysis of all the world's woods as to their
superlatives and characteristics. Their density, their strengths and
many other characteristics. So much of wood knowledge is folklore and
myths and not really the full truths. So we need experts to go into
this and to reveal the best science on "Wood Characteristics".

Archimedes Plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

[Only registered users see links. ] (Archimedes Plutonium) wrote in message news:<618e71c0.0312171129.7c7538a6@posting.google. com>...

See the Book "Understanding Wood, A craftman's guide to wood technology"
ISBN 0-918804-05-1 by R. Bruce Hoadley

[Only registered users see links. ] (Archimedes Plutonium) wrote in message news:<618e71c0.0312171129.7c7538a6@posting.google. com>...

Arch,
You can find a partial list of the comparative strengths and bending
moduli of construction lumber in " Architectural Graphic Standards",
(not at all what the title promises, but an extensive primer on
building design and construction and well worth a trip to the
library).
Spruce was preferred for aircraft construction, and before that for
sailing ship masts and spars because of its high strength to weight
ratio and elasticity. It was not, nor is it now, the only wood used.
Birch is used extensively for wing ribs and sometimes in plywood along
with mahogany. Douglas Fir is sometimes used for spars.
When everything was made of wood, the characteristics of the various
woods were common knowlege, which has virtuallly disapeared today when
other materials are more used. ( Read "The Wonderful One Horse Shay"
for example).
Pragmatist
"The universe is not as strange as you imagine. It is stranger the
you can imagine."

"Archimedes Plutonium" <[Only registered users see links. ]>


Run "Spurce Goose" though Google or same such. The worlds largest wooden air craft.


--
donald j haarmann - independently dubious

Archimedes Plutonium wrote:

<snip>


Didja hear the the superior sound qualities of the
violins of Stradivarius et. al. has been attributed to the
mini-Ice Age?

The trees of the era had much narrower growth rings than
those of modern trees, making their wood stiffer. That's why
it's impossible to make a forgery using wood from trees of
this warm period that sounds "right".

Now all you have to do is extrapolate what kinds of
wood-analogues can grow in planetary chemistries subtly or
wildly different from ours, AND take into acount climatic
variations on said planets.

Good luck.

Mark L. Fergerson

Archimedes Plutonium <[Only registered users see links. ]> schreef

+ + +
Yes, partly. Mostly the wing construction, sometimes the fuselage
+ + +


+ + +
If you think that, you never saw a list of woods (MOE)
+ + +


+ + +
They would have lived in an alternate universe with different physical laws,
so who knows?
+ + +

I know that spruce has a dense foliage

+ + +
Ever look at a spruce?
+ + +

and so
its root and wood system must be special in order to stand upright in
those Colorado wind gales. So the Spruce wood must be strong to
withstand the wind

+ + +
To some extent this goes for just about any wood. However mostly the trick
is not to withstand the winds. Trees that really stand up to the wind have
wood that is worthless as regards to strength properties.
+ + +

but must be light because it is a soft wood.

+ + +
The other way about. An exception reputedly being kadsura
+ + +


+ + +
They might also look in existing encyclopedias
+ + +

So much of wood knowledge is folklore and myths and not really the full
truths.

+ + +
This is self contradictionary.
But indeed people believe the weirdest thing about woods
PvR

donald j haarmann <[Only registered users see links. ].net> schreef
air craft.

+ + +
You mean:
Run "Spruce Goose" through Google or some such.
The world's largest aircaft, made of wood.
PvR

(cut & pasted & snipped)
Thomas Cuny ([Only registered users see links. ]) wrote:

See the Book "Understanding Wood, A craftman's guide to wood
technology"
ISBN 0-918804-05-1 by R. Bruce Hoadley

[Only registered users see links. ] (pragmatist) wrote in message news:<5a53ae0a.0312171431.7e5f3620@posting.google. com>...


donald j haarmann ([Only registered users see links. ].net)
Subject: Re: spruce wood in the Wright aircrafts
Newsgroups: sci.physics, sci.engr, sci.bio.botany
Date: 2003-12-17 14:47:22 PST


"Archimedes Plutonium" <[Only registered users see links. ]>

Run "Spurce Goose" though Google or same such. The worlds largest
wooden air craft.
---

Thanks for the references. I suspect all of the references in the
present literature were never really conducted as per a "full fledged
scientific analysis" and that the numbers achieved in all books on
wood to date are mostly
numbers got from less than a scientific laboratory would get.

I feel that the strength of oak exceeds that of hickory or ash just
from the ability of oak limbs to parallel gravity. I suspect that
hickory and ash are strong but not scientifically as strong as oak. I
suspect too much alterior motives in the books listed above that
provide number comparisons. For example, if someone from the Southern
states of the USA were to conduct a wood analysis
and owned a lumber yard which sold much hickory wood to northern
states would of course looked to make the hickory wood come out
superior to ash or oak.

Trouble with too much of the old literature on wood with number data
is that the testing was not done under Science Rigor. For example: if
I wanted hickory to beat oak and ash, I simply look for a great
hickory sample and look for a poor oak sample or a poor ash sample. To
get a hickory to beat out oak and ash is as simple as finding a
hickory with narrow tree rings to compare with oak and ash of wide
tree rings.

I have the hunch that if a Proper Scientific Analysis were done of
woods for their superior characteristics that most of the old
literature would be found flawed and that is because no-one has done a
proper Science testing.

Archimedes Plutonium
whole entire Universe is just one big atom where dots
of the electron-dot-cloud are galaxies

Archimedes Plutonium <[Only registered users see links. ]> schreef
really conducted as per a "full fledged scientific analysis" and that the
numbers achieved in all books on wood to date are mostly numbers got from
less than a scientific laboratory would get.

provide number comparisons.

is that the testing was not done under Science Rigor.

+ + +
How much of this "old literature" did you see?
+ + +

hickory with narrow tree rings to compare with oak and ash of wide
tree rings.

+ + +
The other way about. Probably would not work either ...
+ + +

woods for their superior characteristics that most of the old
literature would be found flawed and that is because no-one has done a
proper Science testing.

+ + +
Well, it is Official now. Iris is right.
PvR

"Archimedes Plutonium" <[Only registered users see links. ]>



--------
Talking aircraft ....... weight, weight, weight!
Talking wood ..... stability!

Sitka spruce 29.1 lb/cu ft
Red/white oak 47.3

SO: Wood Structural Design Data 1978 ed
[There are latter eds.]
National Forest Products Association


No doubt there is a wood-plane group/org.

--
donald j haarmann - independently dubious

Oh - "Spurce" is the original Indian spelling............ Sure!
Tee-hee.