Osage Orange ram rod question?

Most here know I have an almost fixation with ram rods and have accumulated many. But, I have never had a rod made from Osage Orange. I've wanted to make one but in my areal getting a long and straight enough piece is near impossible. Anybody (Eric ) ever tried making a rr from OO?

It’s possible but would seem a waste of a good bow stave. Osage is super strong but splits easier than hickory. It’s more likely to snap when bent if there is any grain violation at all. Of course we should never bend a ramrod.

I think elm would be the perfect ramrod wood as it’s strong and is among the hardest woods to split. Miserable to work though.

I made 'one' range rod from Osage, it was a fight all the way. I have also made several bows, I would rather make a bow.
Robby

Good info. The split problem is one I never encountered. My OO projects have all been small stuff. (mallets, duck calls, etc.)

Shouldn't be too hard to make one, I might give it a try myself, after it turns it should match the stock of a TC hawken kit I just put together. I have burned a dump truck load of osage scrap probably some wood wood for a ramrod.

I have made an arrow or two out of it, seems like the bare shafts weighed 800 gr or something like that.

Herein lays the problem; grain runout, perfectly straight grain osage is like finding a unicorn. Straightening osage is a piece of cake, much easier than straightening hickory. I heat it with a paint stripping heat gun first to the point that I can barely touch it, then straighten it like one would an wood arrow shaft.

I had intentions of making an axe handle from OO until I realized how heavy it was going to be.

Elm? I have slabs of elm big enough to make coffee tables from....

How would you go about making a ramrod? My thoughts were that a lathe would possibly work, but the small diameter would likely want to bow just from the knife against it, making it hard to get a consistent size.

You could saw out a square down to 1/2 by 1/2. Then scrape to fit a thimble. I would bet as twisted as OO it wouldn’t matter if it was straight grained.
On a side note where do all these extra RR come from? I wish I had just one rifle for every three Rr I own.

Zonie said:

I don't know how well Osage Orange splits but the only way to make a really good ramrod is to make it from a split piece of wood.

Splitting a piece of wood causes it to break along the grain so there is no grain runout. It is basically a bundle of long, continious wood fibers from end to end so it won't split along the grain.

One of the nice things about hickory is it grows with nice, straight grain so when it is split it makes a nice straight ramrod.

You guys who are thinking of machining a ramrod out of a piece of wood are following the mistake that makes store bought dowels wrong for making a ramrod. For wood dowels it doesn't matter but for a ramrod that is being used to shove a patched ball or bullet down the bore it makes a large difference.

By machining the wood, the lathe totally ignores the direction the grain is running. That causes the grain breakout that can split leaving a sharp point that can easily go thru your hand or wrist if it does break along one of the grain patterns.
A sketch of what these grain patterns can be seen below.

View attachment 20123

Click to expand...

Would that be as much of a concern with OO as it seems to grow in three directions at once.
Elm is similar ( I exaggerate, but the wood fibers do seem to twist ur a lot.).
Hickory as tough and springy as it is will mostly split on a plane.

Apple ?
Seems hard and dense.

Zonie said:

I don't know how well Osage Orange splits but the only way to make a really good ramrod is to make it from a split piece of wood.

Splitting a piece of wood causes it to break along the grain so there is no grain runout. It is basically a bundle of long, continious wood fibers from end to end so it won't split along the grain.

One of the nice things about hickory is it grows with nice, straight grain so when it is split it makes a nice straight ramrod.

You guys who are thinking of machining a ramrod out of a piece of wood are following the mistake that makes store bought dowels wrong for making a ramrod. For wood dowels it doesn't matter but for a ramrod that is being used to shove a patched ball or bullet down the bore it makes a large difference.

By machining the wood, the lathe totally ignores the direction the grain is running. That causes the grain breakout that can split leaving a sharp point that can easily go thru your hand or wrist if it does break along one of the grain patterns.
A sketch of what these grain patterns can be seen below.

View attachment 20123

Click to expand...

Finding true split hickory ramrod blanks is virtually impossible unless you make them yourself or know someone who does.

I recently placed an order for 10 hickory ramrod blanks from a guy off eBay. He came highly recommended by many people on the forums, they said his hickory blanks were the best. Well I ordered them and every single one had run out to some degree.

I still can’t figure out how to break a ramrod.

if interested in making one of Osage orange go to eBay, search for Osage orange stave, but a straight one, and have at it.

in bow making OO is known for exploding if there is any runout. Hickory is known for not exploding despite runout. But none of that matters until either wood is bent severely.

Grain is the reason hickory is used for ramrods. It is also the reason you need to hand shave a bow stave, not just cut it out on a band saw. Grain is also the reason hammer forged knives are so much better than saw cut blanks.

If I make one I will do a build along, I have every kind of osage under the sun from as light as pine to as heavy as iron, perfectly knot free straight stuff to stuff with a snake every foot or so. Some very rare osage splits perfectly straight I have some.

I had an old Manton Double years ago that had a rod made of Persimmon , seemed to be very suited to the job and looked good doing it . Three Rivers Archery sells a tool to plane square cut arrow blanks to round , it comes in a couple of sizes and might be usable for some ramrods .