hi i am just wandering is the alcohol method of drying bowls suitable for food safe items like salad bowls
Matter of fact, yes. To do the closest comparison I ran sequential cubes of various species, did a soak versus a control and verified both shrink and time. Also put dye in the alcohol on a set to see how far things actually got in a few hours or a couple of days. Not much. Had a rather lengthy discussion on this forum with Dave the make-believe chemist which prompted the shrink comparison.
Drying was a no-brainer. The results were exactly what anyone who ever thought about how the whiskey got in his glass would have anticipated, even if he never had physical chemistry. I can't confirm your observation regarding the difficulty of sanding flashed surfaces, though I feel it's probably valid. In theory, they should behave as any other case-hardened surface behaves.
Just wondering MM, is this postulation/speculation/theory on your part, or have you, or any one else ever done a side by side measured test to prove this? Yes, I did grow up in the 'Show Me' state, and a lot of people swear by this method.
robo hippy
A couple of years ago I had occasion to discuss this with a wood-products professional that had knowledge in this area. What he told me was basically sometimes it worked, sometimes it doesn't. Some species were more likely to work, and some less, but this was not always true.
They also found that, given the cost of the DNA, the unknowns in controlling the process it was not cost-effective.
Kelly: Mineral oil is TOTALLY inert. It will not react with anything while in a plastic bag. Probably what went wrong is that the wood rotted in the moist enviroment inside the plastic bag. Minerial oil is safe and non-reactive.