Woodsense: Beech

By Robert J. Settich March 4, 2024

Plain looks, but a solid performer

American beech, Fagus grandifolia, may not have the dramatic figure or exciting color to earn a starring role in your next high-end woodworking project, but it is a solid performer that deserves an audition in your shop. Flatsawn beech generally has a bland appearance with subdued figure. Quartersawn beech typically shows tiny ray flecks, though these may sometimes be more pronounced. Regardless of how it’s cut, beech’s tight structure eliminates the need for a grain filler to achieve a smooth finish.

Beech’s plain appearance isn’t necessarily a liability. When showing off your joinery skills, for example, you don’t want flawless hand-cut dovetails to get lost in dark wood or swirling figure. Much like using every fancy wood scrap in your shop to make a cutting board can leave the viewer confused—the eye doesn’t know where to look. Plainer wood plays a supporting role to make fancier woods look their best. Plus, beech is not used to being treated as a star, so it doesn’t ask for top dollar.

Accounting for no taste. I usually apply finish to both sides but made an exception for this flour canister. The exterior got two applications of Waterlox, but the interior is bare to utilize beech’s attribute of imparting no taste.

A wide range of roles

One of beech’s great attributes is that it won’t transfer taste or odor, making it perfect for cutting and charcuterie boards, rolling pins, spoons, and many kitchen accessories. It is also ideal for canisters storing flour (below), rice and other bulk foodstuffs, as well as spices. Chair makers and boat builders prize beech as it steam-bends well. Other commercial uses for beech include everyday items such as sticks for corndogs and frozen treats, tongue depressors, flooring, veneer, and components for building furniture and cabinetry.

Putting beech to work

My experience working with beech began with some web-ordered 8 / 4 stock. I initially noticed a few surface checks but wasn’t too concerned. Over the next week, though, I noticed additional and expanding checks, possibly indicating that the wood was losing a considerable amount of moisture as it acclimated to my shop in early spring. Perhaps the wood I received wasn’t quite as kiln-dried as claimed—always a risk when ordering lumber from afar.

Preliminary sizing cuts at the mitersaw and table saw were problem-free. The jointer gave smooth results with only a minor bit of tearout on a quartersawn edge. The thickness planer also yielded smooth surfaces, but without the level of luster I get when machining maple. After edge-gluing to achieve the stock width needed I then surfaced the beech to 1/2"-thick for the flour canister. I used a router jig for the finger-jointed corners and received crisp results. There were no issues with gluing and sanding, nor with turning a knob for the top.

As for beech’s few shortcomings, it has such poor resistance to insects and borers that calling it “non-durable” would be a compliment. “Perishable” is much more accurate. And it’s prone to warping and checking if not properly dried. Even though I had to avoid checks in several boards with carefully-placed rip and crosscuts I hadn’t initially planned, I was still able to salvage plenty of great material. Rather than making as many canisters as I had wanted, I will instead have plenty of cutting board strips, rolling pins, and kitchen utensils.

Right at home in your shop

Beech earns a rating of 1300 on the Janka hardness scale, just above Northern red oak but slightly less than white ash and white oak. It is also slightly less than sugar maple’s 1450, but that difference shouldn’t disqualify it a solid choice for a stout, sturdy workbench and other shop furniture, fixtures, or accessories. These include tool cabinets and boxes, stools, sawhorses, plane bodies, and handles for non-striking tools.

I also think that beech would be an excellent secondary wood in cabinetmaking; drawer boxes, in particular. Poplar is often recommended for this role, but I find its usual green color hard to take. Additionally—and even more annoying—is poplar’s stringy/fuzzy texture.

Check on wood checking

To help prevent surface splits (checks) in your lumber, let the wood acclimate to your shop before machining it. Allow adequate circulation around each board, but don’t try to speed the process with a fan. Monitor the boards every few days. If a check appears, mark its ends and note the date. If the lumber arrives wrapped in cardboard, individually cover the faces and edges of each board. But leave the endgrain exposed for moisture to escape.

Change your inspections to once a week and allow at least one more week after no new (or lengthening) checks appear. Vigilance counts, but patience counts more.

As with many things in life, try to prevent damage before it occurs, minimize it when it happens, and work around it when necessary.

Throwing shade. American beech is an excellent shade tree in suburban and rural environments. Planted in open areas, the crown can spread to 40 or even 60 feet. The shade can be so dense that it’s difficult to grow anything under the tree.

For the birds. Beech nuts, encased in prickly burred fruits that open in autumn, are popular with birds and small mammals.

Beech trivialities

Are you a sensitive person? In some individuals, successive exposures to beech, especially to the dust, can ramp up allergic reactions in the eyes, skin, and lungs. For this reason, beech is considered a sensitizer that deserves caution.

A good joint. Festool crafts its Domino tenons from beech for strength and great gluing. Most plate joiner biscuits are beech that’s been compressed then die cut.

Making plain wood for planes even plainer. Bailey and Stanley typically slathered a thick coat of yellow-tinted varnish onto the beech plane bodies, totes (handles) and knobs of transitional planes. It gave the parts a uniform look but sometimes completely obscures what little figure the wood had.

A real bruiser. Many craftsmen were reluctant to abandon planes with wood soles because they honestly felt that a cast iron bottom bruised their workpieces. That viewpoint helped keep the transitional plane design in production for 74 years, until 1943.

Basking on a European beech. European beech, Fagus sylvatica, enjoys a wide range throughout that continent and into Asia, but also grows in the United States. Although the tree is a distinctly different species from American beech, the lumber is so similar that even experts have difficulty distinguishing them with absolute certainty.

Tiny pores make a huge difference. Beech is a diffuse-porous wood, and its pores are significantly smaller than those of red oak, making it a suitable choice for end-grain cutting boards.

Not a city-dweller. Beech is generally not well suited to harsh urban environments. In addition, the tree likes to send low horizontal branches over streets and sidewalks.

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