hello everyone tonight
Hi ken and others
relating to the cruck hewing, I am really interested in the method needed to accomplish this job
First if possible just how much of a bow will the cruck have at its centre point?
one of the possibilities that I would certainly look at if this job was shoved my way would be to rough chop the curvature by standing on the top of the log (which no doubt already had some bow to start), and work along the sides.
then by slightly elevating the ends (with a long pry) smooth the inside chopped surface out with an adze,( you could put to good use here a gutter adze or cooper's adze if you had one) you could use a template fabricated from a rough 1" board to go by
then by elevating the centre (using the same long pry) somewhat to a comfortable height I would the smooth the outside surface, once again using the adze, working from the centre towards the 2 ends to accommodate the run of the grain of the tree--you might be able to use a hewing axe for this surface
You should be able to begin to see the Cruck's shape developing, at least its unusual curvature
to do the other 2 sides I probably would chop away most of the unwanted wood, by standing beside the Cruck and then using the adze to remove the remainder, by standing on top
from my take on this unusual job not much hewing would be needed, mainly because of it's shape
The Cruck's shape reminds me of the curvature of the ribs in the ship building trade, where adzing was the main form producing tool used
