port orford cedar???

[Shooter_G22]

   What is port orford cedar???    i went to lowes yesterday to pick a few dowels to make arrows and i went and looked at the cedar boards soo that when i order a dowel cutter i wanted to check on the cedar to get an idea of what some cedar stock would run me to get some cedar shafts done...  but all i saw was some 2x4 cedar planks and maybe some 2x6 cedar boards but i didnt see anything that said port orford cedar and actually the boards thy have there is like a red color cedar.. this is not the same stuff right...   and it was kind of high about 7 buck a 2x4...   well i guess thats not to bad but considering i never pay for 2x4's or 2x6's i always just grab some fromthe job site if i need a couple for home projects they allways have plenty laying around and a buch left over or in scrap piles...   but im sure all the job site wood is pine...  never really paid much attention to what kind of wood goes into my small home projects..

  i also saw some fencing that i think was cedar and smelt like it,  but also red maybe about 1" or 3/4" thick by about 5-6" s  wide by 6' long  but it also looked red...  could shafts be made from this...  well im sure they could but it isnt the port orford right...
 
soo what is port orford cedar and why does everybody cliam it to be the best shaft material avialiable??


   

[Pat B]

Port Orford Cedar (Chamaecyparis lawsoniana) is a large evergreen tree that grows only in southern Oregon and isolated parts of northern California. It is a traditional arrow material because it is straight, remains straight and is relatively light making it a good candidate for arrow wood.
   The cedar you are seeing at lowe's is Western Red Cedar. I don't have the botanical name for it but you can make good arrows with it...I have heard.
   You probably won't find Port Orford Cedar at Lowe's. It is hard for shaft and arrow makers to get good POC any more.     Pat

[Kegan]

Port Orford cedar also seems to be one of the best arrow woods, but almost any cedar works well. I used incense cedar when I made my first board-dowel arrows. At 5/16" they held up from a 60# bow fine (despite all the abuse I gave them ).

[mullet]

 Port Orford Cedar arrows are made from old growth, dead trees.

[Shooter_G22]

ok well here is another few questions???   isnt pine and cedar very close to being the same?   and if soo would it be safe to say that pine would make an ok substitute for cedar arrows???   and if that is true, why are there not alot more pine made arrows if its alot easier to come by?

just brain storming here trying to figure out a good game plane... i was thinking of useing pine anyway...but i sure do like the way the port offord cedar smell...  i opened up a box of PO arrows at a store here in north texas called Bass Pro shop... they sell a little bit of archery stuff and had some PO arrows made by the Martin Co  i wasnt real impressed with the arrows i saw,  but as soon as i open the box i was sudduced by the wonderful smell of a batch of cedar arrows... lol... i know its not the smell that counts but then it hit me that the PO is aclaimed to be the best arrow material also...   and was wondering why and how hard would it be for me to produce some...

but then again smell verses a free board stock substitue like plenty of 2x6's from the job site?? and i begain to wonder how much more performance would cedar have over pine???

i dont have a set up yet but looking into getting one soon hopefully...

[mullet]

 Personally, I like pine over cedar. I have 2 dozen arrows that are pine that I've been shooting off and on since I got them. The shafts were barrel tapered. But I'd rather shoot cane or Bamboo.

[George Tsoukalas]

I make and shoot pine arrows. I like pine. It hand planes easily. Poplar is good too but it takes twice the time to hand plane. Jawge

[Minuteman]

Western Red will do . I figure pine would probably do as well. The WRC is not gonna hold up as well as the pine probably. I've made 'em from WRC and they do work. Haven't made pine though. You'll need super straight grained boards like no run off. Or very little.

[Cromm]

It's the smell that sells them.
You could have a 100 different woods for arrows,but the one you would remember would be the nice smelling ones if you were buying them from a shop.
That's why they sell so well.

[Hillbilly]

I never figured out why people are so gung-ho about cedar. You can look at a cedar shaft wrong and it'll break. I don't usually sniff my arrows too often, so that's not a factor-I like arrows that you can shoot more than once, like cane or hardwood shoots.

[stiknstring]

I have shot cedar...but I would rather shoot the birch I have or the poplar I have...can't wait to set up my dowel cutter I have a whole slew of different woods I want to try...poplar, western red cedar, white pine, cherry, etc etc and so forth

[Auggie]

Now that Ive made a few cane arras,I love em.Wish I had more.

[Shooter_G22]

i like the few bamboo arrows that i have made...   but then i have also had problems with the point getting banged up and spittong on my and eventually cracking and splitting down to the first nods....    i just think that maby the wieght matched and spined and hand straightend good quality cedar r maybe pine shafts will shoot a little more consistant...  i just cant get over the bamboo being a little crocked and all...   maybe just need to get some better shafts or get some of the bamboo arrows that some of you guys are producing to see waht they are suppossed to end up like...   

i'm still trying new stuff and really like to mess with a little of this and a little of that and see waht is going to work better for me....

Auggie,  i havent forgot about you... i think now i know what i can send you in return for that video you sent us

just going to be a while befor i can go harvest anymore bamboo shoots...   i also need some for ourselves and we traded all we had harvested on the last run...

but as for the dowel rod cutter i need to get that set up soon im anxiouse to find out how it will compare to the boo we can harvest here....

plus i dont know if i'm doing the boo corectly...   and i'm still obsessed with wanting to make some really matched cedar or pine shafts taht i can dip and dip crest and put a real nice metalic crest on them and get them shooting like this one doz i bought about 5-6yrs ago...

i want to master that craft of making a really accurate set of arrows.... 

[M-P]

Hi,    My two cents worth  " isnt pine and cedar very close to being the same?"   That's like saying aren't hickory and ash close to being the same thing.   Totally different trees with different wood.
" and if that is true, why are there not alot more pine made arrows if its alot easier to come by?"   I'm not sure why pine isn't more widely used.   Commercially made pine shafting is available.  It's made from lodgepole pine, but for some reason the shafts are sold as "Chondo".  Talk about lack of respect!  The pine shafts I've purchased or made seem to be a little heavier, a little harder to straighten and just as easily broken as POC.
Part of the reason that pine isn't used more widely may be that the current timber harvesting is not geared toward providing arrow wood.  There are many different species of pine, and wood characteristics, especially strength and straightness, vary widely between species.  Construction timbers are unlikely to be marked with species name or selected for arrow shaft quality.
For me the best thing about POC is repeatability.  If I'm making a batch of arrows for competition I want them to be as perfectly matched as I can make them.  POC does that for me.  If I were making arrows for roving / stump shooting I'd want ease of making and durability, like ash or birch.  For hunting  large game, I'd want shafts that were a little heavier and tough, or at least easily repaired, can't beat cane or bamboo.
I've made arrows out of western red cedar ( old fence posts from the pasture)  it is easy to work and makes shafts that are similar to POC in strength and weight.
Ron

[Shooter_G22]

Ron,
  thanks for your input...  it makes alot of sense...  i understand that cedar and pine are two differant trees...  just figured they were pretty similar like hickory and pecan...  are very similar...

i went to buy a board stock in the ruff at a hardwood mill to attempt to make a bow and i asked for hickory and the guy replied yea i got hickory and then said well its actually pecan and i said well i'm looking for hickory and he said well its very close and we class it the same... ?    i didnt know this soo i went ahead and bought the pecan board... made a good bow form it eventually,  but i really wish i had the hickory instead,  but i guess the pecan made an ok substitute...  and i was thinking the same theiry on the pine substitution for the PO Cedar... 

if i cant buy a ruff stock PO Cedar board i know there is plenty of pine available to get anywhere and was thinking that the pine would be an ok substitute and then i was thinkning of maybe useing the red cedar as a substitute as well....   but i guess i will find out soon enough as soon as i can get a good set up to make them...

well anyways,  thanks guys,  for all he information and comments....   i think im just going to have to try it out and get some more experiance...