Oil Soaking Question

[Dan Mosley]

I have used a protocol that Ron Kent uses for soaking his turnings in a oil bath. It has always worked very well with great results. So i got ahold of some Eucalyptus wood the other day (so i think its Eucalyptus anyway) and turned a few pc's to see what it would look like when done. I finished turned the pc's and submerged them in oil. Usually they would float and i would place a rock on them to help hold them under. Then 24hrs later take them out and oil sand them and let dry for 24 hrs and repeat the process 3-4 more times.
However, with this wood (pictures below) both pcs cracked during the first 24hr trial period. One thought of why is that they are very dense and heavy type of wood maybe i should have let them soak for a longer period of time. i have another test pc soaking and im going to let it stay submerged for 48hrs this time and then test it. If it cracks ill try another small pc and soak longer adding 24hr periods onto the protocol.
Any thoughts on this ?????? I am aware of the DNA, Microwave, Brown-Bag etc but i perfer the look and feel of the oil soak method - I just need to get a grip on the soak time / drying i think.............Thanks in advance

Last question: I got a few very large pcs that im going to anchor seal up - I am going to need a outrig -out board turning for my Jet Evs1642 to turn the larger ones and would like to get the kind that attaches to the lathe. Anybody have a Jet that has completed this setup? I would like to ask what you got....How does it work ?

Thanks ahead of time to all that respond...............Dan

 

[Joe Greiner]

No pictures of the turned pieces, as of right now. The shapes could be the culprit, but hard to tell. I suggest you re-name such pictures for a memory aid, and either jot down the filenames or embed temporarily in your upload text, for easier browsing. After uploading the pictures, you can delete the list just before submitting.

Google tells me there are about 700 species of Eucalyptus worldwide.

Joe

 

[MichaelMouse]

The bark has a spiral to it, doesn't it? Could be a difficult wood under there.

Absent some pictures of the turnings, it's probably worth mentioning that thinner survives better than thick, broad bottoms don't survive well in cross-grain cuts, and 24 hours seems a remarkably short time for a wood to get from the fiber saturation point to a moisture level that would contract enough to cause a drying split, unless you're in Death Valley. The spiral bark tells me this might be a candidate for boiling to relieve some of the stress before drying.

There is but one way to dry wood, and that's to let the moisture into the air to be carried away. You can do it quietly and at length, or quickly, but at greater risk. The objective is to keep the surface fiber at more or less the level of the interior throughout the process. If you try to dry/shrink the exterior over a saturated interior, you can get into trouble.

Pictures of the roughs would help, as would some idea of the conditions in which you turned and drip-dried them.

 

[Dan Mosley]

I will post some pics of the turnings this evening - im going to pull them from soak to look at them. When i wrote the above they were in the submereged oil.........Thanks Dan

 

[Hugh]

If there is a chance to get some of the leaves and maybe the seed pods - you might be able to identify the wood easier. As was said - many, many species of eucalyptus. Most of the eucs in my area (Northern Cal) have a much smoother bark except what we cal "Iron Bark Eucalyptus".

I have tried to turn some euc and had very poor luck. Lots of wood movement - going oval plus some twist, cracks, etc. I have tried to boil it with no luck - it did not stop the cracking or the movement. In small pieces I have had some success in the drying process. I have a small stack of it now and am trying again. Then we go to the Blue Gum Eucalyptus......
Hugh

 

[rsser]

Yes, depending on which classification system you subscribe to, there are maybe 700 species of Euc's I'm afraid, and they vary a lot.

To be sure of an id you need data on tree shape, leaves, bark, flowers and nuts.

Some are good if hard turning; many are cr*p. Some are impossible to dry by whatever method without checking or cracking.

In CA your Blue Gum is prob Euc Globulus ... likely to have interlocked grain; should be quarter sawn given the potential for considerable collpase in drying. Downunder it's mostly used in building and can make good flooring.

Most of the Euc I turn is Redgum (Camaldulensis) or Jarrah (Marginata). Less common but more interesting are the Brown and Red Mallee burls which many of you will have seen over your way; also York and Coolabah burls.

Ref: K.R. Bootle Wood in Australia

 

[Barry Richardson]

Dan, Still looks like mesquite to me Have you eliminated that as a possibility? the bark is identical to the landscape mesquite trees around here, even the spiral bark cause they tend to be twisty trees. But the cracking sounds like euc. All you have to do is look at that stuff and it cracks. mesquite is usually very stable. I'm stumped.

 

[Dan Mosley]

ok pulled one of the bowls out of the oil soak tonight and took a picture..........see below..............still not sure what kind of wood but hoping this soak is going to make the difference.
First run i soaked for 24 hrs and then dried at room temp in the garage (still cold out during the day and night here).........cracked out
Second time (see pic) i have soaked for 24hrs and dried for 24hrs....then soaked again for 24hrs and just took them out.....will let dry for 24 and repeat one more time.........wet sanding in between each soak.....so far so good..............any thoughts on this now??

 

[MichaelMouse]

Doesn't look like you've done yourself any favors in the design, which is lovely, but if the bottom is quite broad, you'll have more trouble holding things together. Wood shrinks a certain percentage of saturated dimension, so if you have a 5" wide bottom shrinking 7 percent it will undergo twice the dimensional change and put more angular strain on the end grain than a bottom of maximum 2.5" dimension.

Bring a couple open type pieces up on a bit steeper slope and see if the survival rate improves. Still, as in the book of Wisdom, "time and chance happen to them all." NO guarantees.

 

[Mark Warden]

Soap soak

Hi Dan I was recently on Ron Kents site and he is now soaking in unscented dish soap between rough turning and finishing and then doing the oil soak. Here is a link if you want to check it out. http://ronkent.com/techniques.php
I have used this method quite a few times now and other than minor warping its been working pretty good for me.

 

[Joe Greiner]

You have two small diameters fighting against an intermediate larger diameter, and one of the small diameters is restrained by the bottom. I think this would be trouble in almost any green wood, unless the walls are thin enough to warp to their heart's content (no pun intended).

Deeper shapes would allow more flexing, and therefore less cracking.

Joe