Bark Removal Tips?

[Magicdave]

Has anyone any tips on making removing bark, easier, quicker or both?

Edit: Just to add, I mean without cutting into the actual wood.

[Durham Bushcrafter]

I have heard shooting them through the head or having vocal chords removed by an unscrupulous vet works................... you mean TREES??????" my bad..ooops

[rossbird]

Would one of these help?


http://www.woodlandcraftsupplies.co.uk/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=1_28

[Silkhi]

I have heard shooting them through the head or having vocal chords removed by an unscrupulous vet works................... you mean TREES??????" my bad..ooops

Lol :)

[Magicdave]

Would one of these help?


http://www.woodlandcraftsupplies.co....dex&cPath=1_28

Excellent, thanks. I never knew about these.


I have heard shooting them through the head or having vocal chords removed by an unscrupulous vet works................... you mean TREES??????" my bad..ooops

Boom, boom.

Q. How do you make a cat sound like a dog?
A. Douse it petrol and throw on a match... Wooofffff.

Q. How do you make a dog sound like cat?
A. Run it through a bandsaw... Meaaaaooowwwwww.

[Durham Bushcrafter]

Im glad people here have a better sense of humour than the ''''OTHER WEBSITE'''' that is popular.............T^

[dave budd]

depending on the size and nature of the wood I use a blunt (run your finger along the edge safely blunt!) drawknife or a bark spud for larger areas. The spud looks like a really large blunt chisel on a long handle and is much more efficient. Both of those work best on green wood with nice easily lifted bark, if it is dried in place then a sharp square corner on a bar of steel to scrape it off but it much harder work!

[jbrown14]

At the risk of sounding completely obvious...it's always easiest to remove bark the more recently the wood was cut.

This past summer I had a couple of small Norway Maple saplings coming up in the garden, each about 1" or so in diameter, so I cut them down and made walking staves for my 6 year olds. I sat in a chair in the driveway and peeled the bark off in less than 15 minutes using only my fingernails and my Mora #1 to peel up the bark in the sticky bits.

I've also seen people use a wooden barking spud on larger stuff, similar to this one (http://www.jonsbushcraft.com/images/lime%20bark%20tut/lb6.jpg).

Good luck!

Josh

[Magicdave]

I've not worked with many types of green wood yet, and only 1 that was cut from a healthy living tree. I had started to get the impression that different trees were different.

Taking the bark from a branch cut from a dead ash tree I can't really comment on, I hadn't tried taking it off clean yet. I was cutting it off in strips and going into the sap wood.

Removing the bark from an apple branch,cut from an alive tree, was my first attempt at taking it off clean. I thought it not to be be as easy as it should be.

I've tried with other (unknown to me as yet tees) with varying successes, 1 that I know to Silver Birch is really not easy. The tree was uprooted in a storm, there was one in the area last year that may have been strong enough. But I think it more likely to have been 2 or 3 years ago. The tree still has growth, and is budding on the smaller branches.

[dave budd]

different barks come off more or less easily than each other, but the season you peel makes a huge difference as well as how long it has been off the tree for. For example, Ash peeled from a log in the early summer will come off as a sheet, but try it in the winter and the best you'll get is short ragged strips.

[Magicdave]

different barks come off more or less easily than each other, but the season you peel makes a huge difference as well as how long it has been off the tree for. For example, Ash peeled from a log in the early summer will come off as a sheet, but try it in the winter and the best you'll get is short ragged strips.

Excellent stuff Dave, thank you very much. I had considered the seasonal thing.

[dave budd]

you can make some very cool containers from the whole thickness of bark peeled off trees like ash and cherry if you get the season right. The ash bark is about 5mm thick and very durable, it dries like wood so you have to move it whilst greeen (or re-soak it in a water butt)

[Magicdave]

Nice Dave, I watched Ray Mears do his birch bark container episode when it was first broadcast, I'll look to see if I can find it online. I'm waisting a lot of birch bark at the moment so I think I'll give it a go. I've been meaning to make sheaths for my carving knives, that might have to be the first project. It will also justify (in my head anyway) the time spent to carefully remove the bark.

[Magicdave]

I found this, that I hadn't seen before.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYUqDSxBOAs

I'm going to modify (over the next few weeks) the structure to make sheaths. I'll put a video together to show it. I don't know how to word it, but If anyone can get my thinking it involves gluing the 2 half cylinder sections in there, but not for the full length.

[Pootle]

That's a nice project, thanks for sharing. I like the sheath idea as well; I look forward to a video on it,

[bikebum1975]

Typically just use my knife doesn't take all that much off either. Never used a bark spud but seems interesting

[dave budd]

it's all down to efficiency. If I'm taking the bark off a small stick or three, then I'll use a knife like everyone else. But if I'm stripping a few ash trunks that are a foot across and 20 feet long, then I'll still there when the wood has dried and started to turn to soil! :rolleye: