Last winter I was given some red oak 3x5 that was center cut that I cut into braces. On my last post I was advised to stay well away from the heart of the timber, Thank you, the rest I will. I have noticed that the braces have shrunk, not longitudialy but in width and height. The braces are now a little loose. The end of the tenon now hits on the berring surface inside the mortice and is no longer a 90 degree with the 45 degree sholder. Is this normal with red oak or because I used center cut or green wood? Should I let my new 3x5 stock dry for a month or so before cutting? Thanks John...

John: That depends on how long until you're ready to put your shop/building up. You should be cutting your mortises by planning on the shrinkage. You can review your book, by Jack Sobon, "Build a Classic Timber Frame House" and look at the pictures on pages 88 (in the middle of the page), page 91 (lower right), and page 122. These photos show how and where to hollow out your timbers to take into account the shrinkage. I'm not sure if this will help you with the ones you've already made or not. Good luck with your project, Jim

Hi John,

Our shop has been using red and white oak for braces for nearly 20 years and YES, it does shrink and doesn't look pretty if you put them in green. We also learned the hard way to use free of heart center (FOHC) stock exclusively.

Our solution, since we are in the business of cutting up frames, is to buy our brace stock at 3 1/4" x 5 1/4" minimum green. Then we put it on sticks and dry it for as long as possible. We shoot for at least a year, which in Ohio leaves a nearly dry center. When it's time to cut braces we sort through and save the really nice straight stuff for handrails and saw the rest into brace blanks and plane them to size.

One word of warning is you don't want a really tight green timber brace mortice with a nice dry (pre-shrunk) brace in it, so we cut our braces with a little bit of slop (undersized tenons) so they don't force a check to start. The pre-dried braces stay looking nice and hold their 45 degree angle well.

I wouldn't worry too much about the ones that are in and have shrunk. They're probably still doing the job just fine. We have several nearly 20 year old frams out there with the same problem and none are falling down yet. The hardest thing of all is to quit looking at them and move on.

Good luck with your work.

Rudy

Jim and Rudy, Thanks for your help. I will have my sawyer cut the remainder of my brace stock oversized as you recommended. All my mortices have been cut for shrinkage. The problem now is that I would like to have my raiseing the last weekend of Oct. This will only allow about ten weeks of drying time for my oak stock before I would need to cut the tenons??? Any comments, Thanks, John...

Hi John,

Use thick stickers (1 1/2" min.) and block the stack up well off the ground. Use some old metal roofing or similar to create a flat(ish) roof to keep the sun and rain off.

Rudy

John: A word of caution, if you use a piece of metal roofing, be sure that no rain water drips from the sheet onto your braces, the braces could get stained from the metal in the roofing. I'm sure you've seen how Oak can get a purple stain when in contact with metal. Good luck, Jim