source for baltic birch?

[qingcong]

I'm getting ready to build my speaker cab using baltic birch and wanted to know where some of you guys get baltic birch. I live in southwest Virginia.

[MJL21193]

Why not call a local lumber store? Works for me.

[qingcong]

Originally Posted by MJL21193

Why not call a local lumber store? Works for me.

Yea, done that, but the closest one that carries it is about an hour away. That's okay I guess, but I wanted to see what other options there were.

[jonedd]

I just went through this with my local stores. There are places that you can order it from online, but it's very costly to ship it unless you get at least a partial truck full. When I pushed the issue with the local lumbaryards, they were able to call their distributer and get some options. You may have to be pretty specific with them, because to my surprise, many of the people I spoke with didn't know the difference in the various grades of baltic birch.

[qingcong]

Originally Posted by jonedd

I just went through this with my local stores. There are places that you can order it from online, but it's very costly to ship it unless you get at least a partial truck full. When I pushed the issue with the local lumbaryards, they were able to call their distributer and get some options. You may have to be pretty specific with them, because to my surprise, many of the people I spoke with didn't know the difference in the various grades of baltic birch.

I see. When I went to my local hardware store to ask for baltic birch, he told me that the closest distributor was somewhere in MD and that they only shipped within a certain radius. It turns out that I live about an hour away from this radius.

I found this place online that gives me about what I need -
3/4'' Baltic Birch Plywood Pack: 12 pieces 20'' x 30'' Shipped to You! Lowest Price, Highest Quality for your wood working needs from Woodworkers Source
but I'm a little weary of buying wood without seeing it. The good thing is that they offer a pretty good return policy and it's certainly easiest to get it shipped to my house instead of driving an hour to pick something up. This is my back-up plan.

[masag1]

Do you want to build you cabinet from full birchwood?

If your enclosure seize is more than 50cm, be careful!

Full, or massive wood, as we say here in Germany, must be dried after buying in the lumber shop.

Take the wood in your heater cellar or s.th. like this for some weeks. After this procedure, it will not shrink any more, and the glued joint will not go wide.

My recommondation is multiplex board.

Regards

Sam

[Josephjcole]

I've had good luck in the past calling around to local cabinet builders.
Joe

[fntn]

We have an extra pallet of 60X60 BB. Unfortunately, we're more than 500 miles away and the shipping cost would be nuts otherwise I'm sure we could sell you all you need.

[BillEpstein]

Visit some cabinet makers you'll find in the yellow pages and ask if they'll order you some on a cash basis. Otherwise, ask for the contact info for thier distributor of hardwood plywood and contact them for a cash sale.

Be aware that there is Russian, Finnish and Baltic Birch and that the names may vary locally. In general, Baltic Birch has 'footballs', oval plugs on the good side so best for veneering. Perfect, or "A" side Birch is usually called Finnish.

Lowes sells 4x8 sheets of Arauco 23/32 plywood which I have used to build cabinets that I veneered. Theres a slight chance of having rattling voids but I've encountered none. It's very good.

[jwmbro]

Originally Posted by masag1

Do you want to build you cabinet from full birchwood?

If your enclosure seize is more than 50cm, be careful!

Full, or massive wood, as we say here in Germany, must be dried after buying in the lumber shop.

Take the wood in your heater cellar or s.th. like this for some weeks. After this procedure, it will not shrink any more, and the glued joint will not go wide.

My recommondation is multiplex board.

Regards

Sam

Baltic Birch is a plywood, or as it is known in Germany, Multiplex.