Wood source...next door!

[John Torchick]

My neighbor has a part-time business with a tree service. I have enough wood to build Abe Lincoln a log cabin. Our chapter has a wood lottery as a fundraiser at each meeting. Toss out some species that would be useful for turning. Familiar with some but like your input. I would give him a "list" to save some pieces. What sizes would be best, too? Thanks.

 

[Tim Connell]

Since you have the access, and presumably a lot to choose from, I'd not bother with plain maple, ash, etc, unless you take the logs with the intention of letting them spalt. I'd be looking for fruit and nut trees as those typically have more interesting color and grain. Apple, walnut, cherry, hickory, etc. I'd want to grab as many crotches as possible ( boy, that sounds bad doesn't it?). Assuming that many will be lansdcaping trees, also have the opportunity to grab some out of the ordinary species, or large shrubs (juniper, yew and others) that would make nice spindle blanks.

If you are going to be processing those, I'd stick with the standard sizes for spindle projects. For bowls, there will be a few people who want to go large, but I'd keep most bowl blanks no larger than 12" so those with midi lathes can utilize them. Probably also want to include some hollow form blanks that would be 4-6" square.

 

[Mike Johnson]

I lucked out a few years ago and found some Coffee Tree logs that were cut down in a yard that was adding on to their house. This is another "nut" tree that has worthwhile wood for use in woodworking and woodturning. These are the trees that drop the 10" long dark brown seed pods each year, the wood grain looks similar to mahogany in some ways. These trees should be prolific in Tennessee. Some of the ornamental slow growing trees which don't get very big can have some interesting tight pattern wood grain worth turning.

 

[Dean Center]

When I first started turning, and soon started collecting wood, I'd bring home everything. Fast forward 8 years and I've learned not to screw around with unsound wood. There's no reason to spend 45 minutes cutting and trimming a block, mounting and truing, and cutting away the cracks, only to find out your 13" blank is now a deep 7" blank. Sure, there are blanks with voids, and inclusions, and interesting cracks to repair or fill, and every once in a while it's fun to make something out of one, but there are some blocks that should just get tossed without a second thought. That's a little harder to explain to the arborist, but in time, they'll understand what you'll want.

Also important is to let them know what length to cut the logs--around here they only think about firewood lengths and it's really hard to get them to understand '4 inches longer than the diameter' or '6 inches longer than twice the diameter.'

For raffle wood, Tim's comments are spot on.

 

[John Torchick]

Thanks. I'll pass this along to my neighbor to see what he will be cutting as customers contact him.
Tim, I have plenty of dry wood, just need to find time to turn it. The wood will be donated to our AAW chapter for a fundraiser at each meeting.

 

[hockenbery]

Prizes in your area would be large hollies, large dogwood, American elm, nice ambrosia maple - easy to see in a cross cut, red box elder, Chinese elm, hackberry..... boxwood is a possibility from old homes.

any burls... they will clog up the chipper

@Dean Center advice on length is good.
Y crotches - tree trimmers cut the crotches like spear points eliminating the heart shaped bowls.

we have a guy who calls our club when gets a nice one he leaves it in crane size pieces for us to cut.

 

[John Torchick]

I'm thinking to combine the comments and give them to my neighbor so he can cut accordingly. Or he could give me the wood and I could cut it to size. BTW, he has a huge pile of free firewood.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Time to buy a small sawmill and set it up in the back yard right next to the pile of wood your neighbor has.
You could slab the logs and split the slabs with your neighbor and sell the other slabs to your club members.

Your turning club could possibly raise the funds to purchase a small sawmill which could schedule a monthly
log milling day where club members could get together and process some logs and take home different types
of wood each month that they can add to their wood stash.

Or the club could find a sawmill sawyer with a portable sawmill and set up a pile of logs that need to be cut up and
the club members could share in the cut pieces. Some sawyers will work on a 50/50 split of the slabs for the use of
the sawmill to cut the logs. The only other expense is for saw blades that hit hidden metal objects in the logs.

 

[Glenn C Roberts]

Mike, How thick would you cut slabs for general turning blanks that would satisfy most turners? I had a black walnut I had no idea how to cut, so I did 9/4. I figured the width is enough for bowls, boxes, and 99% of any project I would attempt, I think.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Glenn,

Thickness of blanks is a tough answer, I have ordered custom sized blanks from a sawyer for specific wood types and this can take time finding the right sized log for large dimension turning blanks. The bigger the blank the more money you can get for a dry quality blank, but the bigger the blank the longer it takes to dry out. All depends on what you intend on doing with the wood blanks will determine how dry it needs to be. For the average wood turner making bowls and vases and other hollow forms the moisture content is not a concern. If you are doing flat work or segmented pieces moisture content is a big issue. I make wood and metal tools for the Pyrotechnic Guild which requires a stable wood that will not warp over time. Some of these guild members are looking for "Wall Hangers" tools that they display in their work shops that they show off to other people interested in the art form.

 

[hockenbery]

Popular bowl blanks about the center of the tree so that the grain is balanced.
The height should be about 1/2 the diameter to allow a hemisphere shaped bowl.

12” diameter 5-6.5 height is a nice blank

There are lots of ways to cut blanks. The advantage of harvesting wood is you can cut for grain balance.
Grain balance around the center of the log will have symmetric grain that looks best most of the time and a benefit of the bowl warping symmetrically when it dries.

cut platter blanks from the center of large trees. Face cuts parallel to the pith.
2 Quarter sawn blanks on each side of the pith
Rift sawn platter blank centered on the pith face cuts parallel to the pith

bowl blanks cut near the face of the log face cuts parallel to the bark edge. The bowl bottom will be near the bark so you can have bark curvature. hope this diagram hells instead of confusing.

 

[Bruce Miller]

That simple diagram is tremendously helpful to me, thanks for posting it.

 

[Glenn C Roberts]

+1 on the diagram, and thanks Mike for the reply.

 

[Mike Johnson]

The diagram works for your typical bucked logs but gets more complicated on the logs that have multiple branches which is what most wood turners really want.
These pieces usually require a little more effort to determine how to maximize the potential wood grain or number of blanks from the piece. The crotch of the branch
has the potential of providing various types of wood grain that can make for stunningly beautiful wood pieces. Determine where the crotch grain should be and then
try to determine a shape of a bowl or platter that will have the crotch grain left in the piece and not turned away and turned into shavings on the floor.

 

[hockenbery]

The diagram works for your typical bucked logs but gets more complicated on the logs that have multiple branches which is what most wood turners really want.

crotches are indeed different beasts.

The link below is to a thread on turning a NE bowl from a crotch. It includes a link to slides I use which show how to cut the crotch blank and find the center for the initial mounting to get a heart shaped bowl with the crotch feather grain in the bottom. i also talk about bark inclusions which are found in many crotches making then unsafe to turn. Also a video of the demo turning the NE bowl from a crotch.

https://www.aawforum.org/community/index.php?threads/naural-edge-bowl-from-a-crotch.11058/

There are a lot traditional bowl Makers out there.

 

[John Dillon]

Popular bowl blanks about the center of the tree so that the grain is balanced.
The height should be a little over the diameter to allow a hemisphere shaped bowl.

12” diameter 5-6.5 height is a nice blank

There are lots of ways to cut blanks. The advantage of harvesting wood is you can cut for grain balance.
Grain balance around the center of the log will have symmetric grain that looks best most of the time and a benefit of the bowl warping symmetrically when it dries.

cut platter blanks from the center of large trees. Face cuts parallel to the pith.
2 Quarter sawn blanks on each side of the pith
Rift sawn platter blank centered on the pith face cuts parallel to the pith

bowl blanks cut near the face of the log face cuts parallel to the bark edge. The bowl bottom will be near the bark so you can have bark curvature. hope this diagram hells instead of confusing.

View attachment 31424

"The height should be a little over the diameter to allow a hemisphere shaped bowl."

Just to clarify Al. You are saying height is ideally about 1/2 of diameter? So, 12" dia. height would be in range of 5" to 6.5"? Thanks

 

[hockenbery]

"The height should be a little over the diameter to allow a hemisphere shaped bowl."

Just to clarify Al. You are saying height is ideally about 1/2 of diameter? So, 12" dia. height would be in range of 5" to 6.5"? Thanks

that is correct - Didn’t word that well-

Look at Helen Bailey’s wave bowl in the gallery. Nice example of a hemispherical bowl.
She lists the bowl at 5.5d 2.5h

There will be some loss of height in the turning and perhaps a loss of 1/2” for a tenon.
The hemisphere bowl heights are usually a little less than 1/2 the diameter so that the rim is still curving out a bit.

 

[Mike Johnson]

Another concern for turners when felling a tree and bucking the logs into useable pieces is how long to cut them.
The more time the cut pieces sit without being processed into useable pieces (bowl blanks and spindle blanks) the quicker they create checking and cracking on the ends.
If the log is 12" in diameter it helps to cut them several inches longer on each end so you can remove the checking and cracking end grain when you get around to cutting the logs into the finished sized blanks and seal the end grain with an appropriate sealer. Many wood types will quickly start checking and cracking on freshly cut end grain if they are not sealed on a timely basis after the log is bucked. The longer time you plan on having the cut logs sit around, the longer length you should plan on cutting them so you can trim the checking and cracking from the end grain when you finally get to them. Cutting and loading and transporting a pile of logs is a lot of work and painting sealer on the ends usually ends up being a late night task after you worked hard all day getting the wood home. If you wait too long to seal the end grain you waste a lot of time and effort and wood that ends up checking and cracking.

If you end up with logs showing large amounts of checking and cracking, you can cut the log along major cracks were the log is releasing stress in the piece. If the log has several cracks you can cut along these stress lines and salvage the log into useable spindle blanks. At this point you are cutting "fire wood" and many woodturners have turned nice pieces salvaged from a pile of fire wood.

 

[John Torchick]

Time to buy a small sawmill and set it up in the back yard right next to the pile of wood your neighbor has.
You could slab the logs and split the slabs with your neighbor and sell the other slabs to your club members.

Your turning club could possibly raise the funds to purchase a small sawmill which could schedule a monthly
log milling day where club members could get together and process some logs and take home different types
of wood each month that they can add to their wood stash.

Or the club could find a sawmill sawyer with a portable sawmill and set up a pile of logs that need to be cut up and
the club members could share in the cut pieces. Some sawyers will work on a 50/50 split of the slabs for the use of
the sawmill to cut the logs. The only other expense is for saw blades that hit hidden metal objects in the logs.

There would be no place for me or the club to store it, plus the chapter budget wouldn't allow it. I'll talk with him and see what he has in store.

 

[Mike Johnson]

John,

That is were you could coordinate and have a sawyer bring a sawmill to the club event or have the club members transport logs to the sawmill on a predetermined date.
Depending on the number of logs this would most likely be a full day or weekend event for a larger club. For a club member that has a rural residence they could easily
pay for a small sawmill by selling wood slabs on the side and over time end up with a good selection of wood for various projects. Plenty of sawmills out there they just
need to pay for saw blades, consumables and small stuff like trucks, trailers, lifting equipment, moving equipment, property, insurance, loan payments and their time.

 

[John Torchick]

Mike, good suggestions and thanks but our meeting place is very picky about how we leave the place after a meeting. I have a long "to-do" list for our January meeting. Transportation to anywhere wouldn't be possible. Plus, our members are scattered and the logistics might not be acceptable. I'll find our where he is working and pick up a few pieces.

 

[Mike Johnson]

John,

You could also just go with an Alaskan Chainsaw Mill, but they are a lot of work, not very fast and hard on chains. With a bigger horsepower chainsaw and a long bar you can slab some good sized trees. Many saw mills use these when the sawmill they have won't handle the diameter of the log they need to cut. Maybe you can work something out with your neighbor if he has a big enough chainsaw to handle a long bar and chain.

 

[hockenbery]

You guys are over complicating this.
No need to go into production on bowl blanks.

A half dozen 1/2 logs 4” longer than wide for the meeting raffle or whatever is 3 to 6 crosscuts and 3 rip cuts through the pith.

 

[Daniel Miller]

crotches are indeed different beasts.

The link below is to a thread on turning a NE bowl from a crotch. It includes a link to slides I use which show how to cut the crotch blank and find the center for the initial mounting to get a heart shaped bowl with the crotch feather grain in the bottom. i also talk about bark inclusions which are found in many crotches making then unsafe to turn. Also a video of the demo turning the NE bowl from a crotch.

https://www.aawforum.org/community/index.php?threads/naural-edge-bowl-from-a-crotch.11058/

There are a lot traditional bowl Makers out there.

Not to highjack the thread, but since the old thread is several years old, I thought I'd here rather than bring it up on the old post....

John was asking about the shear cut on the inside of the bowl and Al mentioned having someone demonstrate in person how this was done. As I'm trying to expand my knowledge and skills, one thing I've seen several people talk about it "riding the bevel", and in learning how to turn better I've started taking this approach with rolling the gouge into the wood until it starts to ride the bevel and then finish my cut from there. Reading this about the shear cutting in the other thread, I'm wondering.... would this shear cut be the same process? Start with your gouge's unground wing riding the wood and then slowly rotating the wing over and into the wood until it begins making the cut, then pulling it back along the wood until you've finished the "cut"?

 

[hockenbery]

I've started taking this approach with rolling the gouge into the wood until it starts to ride the bevel and then finish my cut from there. Reading this about the shear cutting in the other thread, I'm wondering.... would this shear cut be the same process? ?

you GOT it!!!!!

SUCCESSFUL CUTS begin with the A B C s

A- anchor - tool on the tool rest not touching the wood

B- bevel- bevel on the wood not cutting

C- cut- keeping the bevel on the wood the cutting edge is engaged by some combination of lifting and rotating the handle.

As you progress this is all done with one motion.

Cuts that start off the wood the bevel can be lined up on the wood then pulled off, moved slightly to cut, then engage the wood slowly to cutting with the lined up bevel making a place for the bevel to ride.

In practice these steps all occur in one motion making it difficult to see the individual parts.
When the cut precedes the bevel contact you usually get either tear-out or a catch.

When I use the term shear cut it is a flute up cut on the leading edge of the wing and is pushed forward with the nose leading the cut. The high angle on the front of the wing provide the shearing angle to produce a clean cut.
Hi
the pull cut is made on the top of the wing with the handle down pulling the nose behind the cut. flute is generally up

the push cut is made on either side of the nose with the flute between 45 degrees and near horizontal?

 

[John Torchick]

Admin, we can close this thread as the wood is going on the wood pile next door.