I know that in general wood hardly shrinks at all along its length, but a lot across its width. I was wondering, with a stave type construction (eg tankards or small barrels) where they use hazel or birch hoop's, do they have some way of shrink fitting (the hoops-not the staves which I assume are dry when assembly takes place) to squueeze the staves up, how do they do it as they would need to shrink along the length of the wood? Or do they make the hoops a bit smaller and drive them on to tiighten them up as a normal wet cooper does with the iron staves? Also does cordage such as bramble/nettle etc shrink along its length? I saw a very old tankard as was hooped up with sailmakers twine. I noticed some finnish stuff done cooperd but it was all in suomi language. Does any one have any thoughts or sudgestions ?
cheers Jonathan
cheers Jonathan
