Re: Bass vs Obechi

Boo Wrote:

Bass is not a 'flavor' of balsa, it's a completely different species.
Spruce, and perferrably Sitka Spruce, is considerably stronger tha
bass, and is the wood of choice for structural components.

Obechi is somewhere between bass and spruce in hardness, which makes i
suitable for sheeting.  OTOH sheeting with balsa and covering wit
epoxy/glass results in a less expensive and more durable skin.

Bass isn't really all that good for our sort of modeling because it'
more brittle and less tolerant of bending loads than spruce, an
because it's heavier than balsa.

I use plain old Red Oak for servo bearers.  It's not all that muc
heavier than spruce or bass, and it's a good deal harder and stronger.
The weight penalty for Red Oak mounts is negligible, and you can make
-lot- of mounts from a 1x12x48 Red Oak plank from The BORG.

I also use 'these
(http://www.microfasteners.com/catalog/products/TWSSHWHMS.cfm) serv
mounting screws.  The socket head makes it a lot easier to drive tha
standard servo mount screws.

You should be using a hard wood for servo bearers, not bass or spruce
although you can 'get away with' the softer woods.

You won't split any more bearers if you pre-drill the screw holes a
Frank pointed out

--
the-plumbe

Hi,

I bought a couple of strips each of 1/8" x 3/8" obechi and bass wood today to
use as servo bearer reinforcements having got tired of slicing up 1/8" plywood
into strips.   I didn't buy spruce because it has a tendency to split when you
put screws into it.

I know it doesn't matter much for this application but can anyone tell me the
differences in these two woods (obechi and bass) when it comes to aeromodelling
?  Bass seems like a vewry good quality quite hard balsa and I would seriously
consider using it for wing spars and fuselage longerons where balsa's
variability can be a nuisance.  I know obechi is used for skinning foam wings
which presumeably means it's good for making into veneer but what is it good for
in strip form ?

Any comments welcome (probably :-)

Cheers,