Drying Horticultural Maple

Specialty Maples used in landscaping dry like other Maple, but the wood tends to be twisty. June 16, 2014

Question (WOODWEB Member) :
We are in the process of sawing a bunch of maple for a customer and my dad is calling it cut-leaf maple - is he correct? We have never sawed anything that looks like this. Also I am supposed to kiln dry it for him. There is an obvious twist in the lumber - what should I expect when I dry this - airplane propellers? What schedule is recommended? Also, what kind of price would anyone put on this type of wood?

Forum Responses
(Sawing and Drying Forum)
From Gene Wengert, forum technical advisor:
Cut leaf maple is a horticultural variety of maple and would not be a commercial lumber species. It would be expected to have a lot of tension wood, which you are seeing. It would not be plentiful, so the fact that you have a bunch of logs suggests a different species.

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From the original questioner:
Gene, the customer said he bought the truck load from a tree removal service, and they all were butt logs. From what I found out it looks like very large ambrosia maple. Anyway, what drying schedule would you recommend to help with the tension issues I will run into?

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From Gene Wengert, forum technical advisor:
Dry it like hard maple using a "white" schedule. I doubt that you can do anything about the growth stress.