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Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
By:Luke
Date: 2/29/2012, 1:44 pm

Has anyone ever split their ribs (with a froe or wedge) instead of ripping them on a saw?

I ask for a couple reasons:
1) Sounds like fun
2) I don't have a table saw, so I'd need to either rip on my bandsaw (doable, but needs to be planed after the fact, and it can be a little inconsistent), or rip at someone else's house (hassle), or get the mill to rip them for me (more expensive, quality not assured).
3) The split would follow the grain, so no runout, leading to fewer broken ribs during construction, and presumably stronger ribs in general. I suspect I'd have some bad splits though, so I imagine I'd end up getting a similar number of ribs out of a decent board.

I realize the split ribs will probably need to be planed, which doesn't bother me, I can hit them with a hand planer to smooth things out a bit, I don't require maximum precision or perfect finish. I want to avoid bandsawing, because if I'm going to have to plane the ribs anyways, it seems I might as well try and get the benefits of split ribs.

I'll be using either white oak or white ash most likely, probably white oak, although my local lumbermills are brimming with white ash because of all the beetle-killed trees here, so it might be enough cheaper to justify it's use.

If you've ever attempted this, any problems you noticed? Tips on splitting in general? What tools did you use - a froe seems like the natural choice here, but maybe something else is more suited to making small ribs.

Messages In This Thread

Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
Luke -- 2/29/2012, 1:44 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
John Abercrombie -- 2/29/2012, 2:43 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
Luke -- 2/29/2012, 3:08 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
Thomas Duncan -- 2/29/2012, 9:07 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
Brian Nystrom -- 3/1/2012, 7:03 am
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Splitting ribs
Foster -- 3/1/2012, 12:16 pm