# Wood for first saya



## wbusby1 (Oct 3, 2016)

Was going to try my hand at a saya and have heard that other members have used poplar. I was at lowes today and the manager there recommended their "whitewood" but they had poplar and pine too. I can also find pine salvage and occasionally cypress & others. Looking for function here and ease of use. What do y'all recommend?


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## jessf (Oct 3, 2016)

Function and ease of use = balsa. Cheap, easy to cut and nice and soft on the blade.


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## brianh (Oct 3, 2016)

Craft stores are better for this type of wood. Dunno what's by you, but here it's Hobby Lobby, AC Moore, Michaels.


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## wbusby1 (Oct 3, 2016)

brianh said:


> Craft stores are better for this type of wood. Dunno what's by you, but here it's Hobby Lobby, AC Moore, Michaels.


 I have a Michaels relatively close but what wood do you recommend?

Jessf: Balsa isn't too soft/delicate? I'm going to be carrying this knife/saya around in a backpack full of junk almost daily.


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## jessf (Oct 3, 2016)

I generally use the 5/32 thickness. It gets dinged up but ive never had one break up. I carry them in a backpack too but likely with less junk.



wbusby1 said:


> I have a Michaels relatively close but what wood do you recommend?
> 
> Jessf: Balsa isn't too soft/delicate? I'm going to be carrying this knife/saya around in a backpack full of junk almost daily.


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## toddnmd (Oct 3, 2016)

If you do the "sandwich method", you can use something soft (I used basswood, in the thickness necessary for the spine) between sheets of harder wood. If you wanna go cheap, you could just get some red oak or maple that's easily available for the outside pieces (or order something more exotic, 1/8 thickness should be fine).
If you're gonna go to the trouble of making a saya, it doesn't cost that much more, or take that much more time, to make it look good.


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## milkbaby (Oct 3, 2016)

For a laminated saya, I vote basswood or balsa for the middle piece as it's soft and gentle on your blade edge.

I don't have any power tools except a borrowed drill, so if you're like me, then I vote basswood as you can still cut it relatively easy with a handsaw or even boxcutter. It's a bit more resistant to dings on the outside than balsa. I also made a saya out of pine by hand; it was more difficult to work with only hand tools, but it's also nicer looking due to more interesting wood.

If you have a table saw, band saw, and/or belt or disc grinder, then I vote cool looking wood on the outside with basswood or pine for the inner layer.


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## toddnmd (Oct 4, 2016)

Any chance you could borrow a jig saw from someone? That would give you options.


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