Is this wood or micarta?

K

Kevin Kf knives

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I work in the power industry, and was taking apart an old oil breaker. I was thinking it might be plywood, but when I sanded it, it smelled more like micarta. It's been soaking in oil for probably 40 years.

Thanks, I hope the picture works.
 
Everything I’m seeing says wood

Everything you are saying says micarta

????
 
It looks like about 12 layers. I was sure it was wood until I cut and sanded it. The sawdust is yellow, and it's a pretty distinct smell. It's under a tremendous amount of pressure when the breaker opens and closes. Plus its completely submerged in mineral oil.

Thanks for looking
 
Look up "Permali Wood". It's basically the same as dymond wood (sp?) which is a plywood impregnated with phenolic resin under vacuum. Siemens/Allis Chalmers uses it, or used to use it, in their oiled breakers, from what I understand. Both Permali wood and dymondwood are simply trademark names for the product of their respective manufacturers (Permali Wallace and Rutland Plywood, respectively).
 
Drew Riley said:
Look up "Permali Wood". It's basically the same as dymond wood (sp?) which is a plywood impregnated with phenolic resin under vacuum. Siemens/Allis Chalmers uses it, or used to use it, in their oiled breakers, from what I understand. Both Permali wood and dymondwood are simply trademark names for the product of their respective manufacturers (Permali Wallace and Rutland Plywood, respectively).
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Came out of a Siemens breaker, so it makes sense. Thank you.
 
Just make sure it came out of mineral oil and not PCB oil. If there's any doubt at all, do yourself a favor and get rid of it. I'm sure I don't have to tell you, but PCB oil was some very gnarly and toxic stuff.
 
Drew Riley said:
Just make sure it came out of mineral oil and not PCB oil. If there's any doubt at all, do yourself a favor and get rid of it. I'm sure I don't have to tell you, but PCB oil was some very gnarly and toxic stuff.
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What he said^^^ There can be all kinds of toxics in mystery Dynawoods like that! Wear a good Respirator! Those processed Woods release Formaldehyde that will pickle your brain over time!
 
Rhinoknives1 said:
What he said^^^ There can be all kinds of toxics in mystery Dynawoods like that! Wear a good Respirator! Those processed Woods release Formaldehyde that will pickle your brain over time!
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I was just thinking about the oil it was soaking in, but you're right. There's no telling what kind of phenolics and other chemicals were used for the wood itself, especially if it was manufactured 40+ years ago
 
Good call on the oil and contaminates. Our breakers were tested for PCB back in the 90s, but people I know people in other companies will give me stuff they get out of old equipment that I have no idea what's in it. I need to remember to ask from now on.

This stuff looks nice in my opinion, almost the same color as ironwood. Looking forward to seeing a finished handle.

Thank you guys for the help identifying it.
 
I have a bunch of what I call wood micarta. It is phenolic impregnated wood laminate. The old stuff by Westinghouse indeed does look like ironwood. The newer stuff looks more like walnut. Once ground to shapeon the handle, they both look like solid wood without close examination.
I use it to repair old kitchen knives that were done in cutlery plywood. If you look at the wood handles on many kitchen knives you will see it is actually laminated wood.

Cutlery plywood and the wood micarta have much finer layers than dymondwood and pakawood.
 
The funny thing to me is, I've worked around this kind of stuff for so long, I've only been making knives about a year-ish, but I've just thrown a lot away. If I kept half of it, the wood and so much micarta, I could make knife handles for the rest of my life. I'm definitely keeping an eye out for this stuff now.

I decommissioned a couple of 138KV oil breakers that had this wood about 6 feet long and was almost 4 inches by 4 inches. That would make a knife handle or two.
 
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