I like Ash for timberframing. It tends to have very few knots. Some of my ash timbers have checked (big time), and some have not. Comparable to Oak in that regard (no worse and no better, on average). Does not have the rot or stain resistance of Oak, but not an issue so long as you keep it dry. I also made about a dozen 3x8 braces with ash and none of those have checked.

Black locust makes great pegs (and fence posts). I would bet that honey locust would too. I've never had a locust tree big enough to make a timber... if you find some, be sure to complete the joinery while it's green! I hope to find enough locust of useable size to deck my porch when I get to that point.

I used some soft maple for floor joists (red, not silver - I don't have any silver maples here on the farm). Beautiful figure. One red maple floor joist misbehaved (checked and twisted too much before the raising) and had to be culled. But you can get that with any species.

I have 14 species of hardwood (not counting the variations within red oaks and white oaks) in my frame, and none have failed yet... knock on wood.



The beam in the upper right of this picture is ash (large check visible on this face only), as is the floor joist that joins it, as are the two knee braces. Post is N. red oak, and the wall girt/joist is white oak. Bigger version of this same photograph available on my website, http://massiehouse.blogspot.com