Hey folks, I'm an intermediate turner/arborist in Tn. I'm wondering if anyone has a tried/true method of preparing green blanks, sealing (I'm using anchor seal) and storing until dry. I'm very familiar with turning and storing green wood. So far there are many cracks in my process. I do have the ability to store logs but looking to try different methods. So far turning dry blanks (with cracks) for practice has been incredibly different. Thanks and stay cool!
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green blank prep. until dry
- Thread starter JJ Bergman
- Start date
Pretty much impossible to store green blanks/slabs without them cracking. I prefer whole logs, in the shade some where, white tarps under and on top, and then cut off as needed. Wood over 8/4 or 2 inches thick never reaches "equilibrium" so the middle is moister than the outside, this causes stress, and wood relieves stress by cracking. Thicker slabs are much more prone to this than thinner ones. 2 inch thick, you might get away with it, 3 inch or thicker, and you don't get away with it....
robo hippy
robo hippy
Thanks, makes sense. I’ve learned tons from your videos. Thanks for those too.
john lucas
AAW Forum Expert
You have to keep them in an area with very little air movement and out if direct sunlight. I thought I had it down to a science in my old shop. Moved and started having cracks. The blanks are stored in an attached shed with my dust collector. It's an insulated steel attached shed. I started having cracks. It was the air movement from the dusty outside often can't see these crack. collector. I put shower curtains up across the shelves. Rooms to be working now. Another trick I use is to put plastic bags over the ends of the logs as soon as they are cut. I find wood starts to crack as soon as it's cut if sun and wind hits it. I keep the bags on until i have time to process tge wood. Since I started doing this my losses were greatly reduced.
Hello JJ.
I do this all the time, for close to 20 years now, many, many hundreds. I have a good success rate. However, "banks" is a encompassing word and means different things to different people. I think my largest was 10"x10"x14" maple, end grain orientation, no pith. Small is trivial.
Some big variables are the type of wood, the size of the blank, what kind of blank (can the pith be removed?), how and where it is cut from the tree, the grain orientation, what time of the year it was cut, how sealed (of course), and the storage/drying environment. (My shop and wood drying/storage areas are climate controlled.)
And of course proper sealing implies not only the sealer used but where to seal (sometimes I have to seal more than the end grain).
I find off-the-shelf Anchorseal almost worthless for drying green blanks. I've written elsewhere of how I thicken Anchorseal to make it far more useful.
The specific tree and how it grew is a huge variable. For example, our native black cherry is notorious for starting to check almost immediately after cutting. But I had one large cherry that simply refused to check and crack - even for a log section I left out in the sun for years as a test. Sadly, I'm down to my last piece of that tree - still round, contains the pith, not cracked after a dozen years. Magic...
On a side note, realize some blanks, depending again on certain factors, may take years or even a decade to dry.
I made a video on preparing and drying blanks for a pandemic club Zoom meeting. It needs some revising (and shortening) but might be useful if you haven't seen it. It's mostly about cutting blanks on the shop bandsaw but I included some things about sealing and drying.
Also, other steps can be taken, such as boiling wood - almost needed to stop the cracking for certain tropical species, but it has a few downsides. The late wood exporter Jim King from Iquitos, Peru, told me some big blanks I got from him "had" to be boiled or they would self-destruct. (But I didnt boil, instead I cut them into smaller pieces.)
I see you are in Nashville. Do you ever get over to the Knoxville area? I have need for an arborist to work on some fruit trees when the season is right. (Besides being no good at that, I'm not allowed to climb anymore, not even a ladder!) I have a tree guy cut where needed but he only cut trees down or trims the limbs I point to with a green laser.)
JKJ
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Stick with twice turning bowls. You’ll get few cracks the better your bowls are.
Unfortunately the deck is stacked a bit against beginners.
You will have increasing success as you turn more and learn more.
Experienced greenwood turners rarely lose a piece to cracking.
You can often skip a year or two ahead in experiment level with a quality class.
Beginners lose a fair percentage that decreases rapidly over as they gain skills. This is a key slide from my working with green wood demo. Beginners often don’t do well on more than half the bullet points.
A thread on Greenwood’s turning. With all the notes, video roughingva bowl, video returning a dried warped bowl
Does anyone seal again a few months later—I.e. after the initial Anchorseal application? If so, what parameters to decode?
There are innumerable methods and combinations of tricks that turners use to get wood to dry without cracking. Some of it is climate. A lot of it is voodoo. I recommend you get advice from folks in your general geography (if I understand how TN is built, John's way the heck the other side o' the holler from you but probably it would be similar), try out the suggestions you get, mix and match, and eventually you will hit on a system that works.
Nashville is less than 3 hours drive from Clinton without speeding. Go there sometimes on a whim. And yes, we have similar climate and wood species.
JKJ
I just have to ask - why? Yeah, yeah, @John K Jordan has filled us in on “wet wood is easy, dry is more challenging”
. Well, 2nd turns are dry wood.Perhaps I’m missing something, but it seems to make much more sense to rough turn a wet blank, dramatically reducing the dry time, and much less risk of cracks. I don’t understand waiting 5+ yrs for something to dry that may end up cracking.
I do have some 3-4” squarish, longish spindle Blanks (and smaller), but bigger than that gets roughed wet.
I've even heard of people once-turning wet wood to final thickness, maybe leaving the bark on it, then letting it dry and warp like crazy. Gasp!
Wait, did that myself a time or two. Fun and easy to turn. A bit messy.
john lucas
AAW Forum Expert
I often leave wood full size because I turn so many different things. A bowl blank may end up a hollow form or may be cut up into smaller box forms. If I rough turn it into a hollow form or bowl then that's what it has to be when it's dry. I.like to keep my options open. If it starts to crack then it simply becomes something smaller.
Hello JJ.
I do this all the time, for close to 20 years now, many, many hundreds. I have a good success rate. However, "banks" is a encompassing word and means different things to different people. I think my largest was 10"x10"x14" maple, end grain orientation, no pith. Small is trivial.
Some big variables are the type of wood, the size of the blank, what kind of blank (can the pith be removed?), how and where it is cut from the tree, the grain orientation, what time of the year it was cut, how sealed (of course), and the storage/drying environment. (My shop and wood drying/storage areas are climate controlled.)
And of course proper sealing implies not only the sealer used but where to seal (sometimes I have to seal more than the end grain).
I find off-the-shelf Anchorseal almost worthless for drying green blanks. I've written elsewhere of how I thicken Anchorseal to make it far more useful.
The specific tree and how it grew is a huge variable. For example, our native black cherry is notorious for starting to check almost immediately after cutting. But I had one large cherry that simply refused to check and crack - even for a log section I left out in the sun for years as a test. Sadly, I'm down to my last piece of that tree - still round, contains the pith, not cracked after a dozen years. Magic...
On a side note, realize some blanks, depending again on certain factors, may take years or even a decade to dry.
I made a video on preparing and drying blanks for a pandemic club Zoom meeting. It needs some revising (and shortening) but might be useful if you haven't seen it. It's mostly about cutting blanks on the shop bandsaw but I included some things about sealing and drying.
Also, other steps can be taken, such as boiling wood - almost needed to stop the cracking for certain tropical species, but it has a few downsides. The late wood exporter Jim King from Iquitos, Peru, told me some big blanks I got from him "had" to be boiled or they would self-destruct. (But I didnt boil, instead I cut them into smaller pieces.)
I see you are in Nashville. Do you ever get over to the Knoxville area? I have need for an arborist to work on some fruit trees when the season is right. (Besides being no good at that, I'm not allowed to climb anymore, not even a ladder!) I have a tree guy cut where needed but he only cut trees down or trims the limbs I point to with a green laser.)
JKJ
Thanks, I don't get to Knoxville much. Hopefully you can get ahold of an arborist in your area. I guess I'll keep trying here and there. I'm thinking of getting away from the anchor seal as I hear many are using different sealers. Gonna check out the video.Hello JJ.
I do this all the time, for close to 20 years now, many, many hundreds. I have a good success rate. However, "banks" is a encompassing word and means different things to different people. I think my largest was 10"x10"x14" maple, end grain orientation, no pith. Small is trivial.
Some big variables are the type of wood, the size of the blank, what kind of blank (can the pith be removed?), how and where it is cut from the tree, the grain orientation, what time of the year it was cut, how sealed (of course), and the storage/drying environment. (My shop and wood drying/storage areas are climate controlled.)
And of course proper sealing implies not only the sealer used but where to seal (sometimes I have to seal more than the end grain).
I find off-the-shelf Anchorseal almost worthless for drying green blanks. I've written elsewhere of how I thicken Anchorseal to make it far more useful.
The specific tree and how it grew is a huge variable. For example, our native black cherry is notorious for starting to check almost immediately after cutting. But I had one large cherry that simply refused to check and crack - even for a log section I left out in the sun for years as a test. Sadly, I'm down to my last piece of that tree - still round, contains the pith, not cracked after a dozen years. Magic...
On a side note, realize some blanks, depending again on certain factors, may take years or even a decade to dry.
I made a video on preparing and drying blanks for a pandemic club Zoom meeting. It needs some revising (and shortening) but might be useful if you haven't seen it. It's mostly about cutting blanks on the shop bandsaw but I included some things about sealing and drying.
Also, other steps can be taken, such as boiling wood - almost needed to stop the cracking for certain tropical species, but it has a few downsides. The late wood exporter Jim King from Iquitos, Peru, told me some big blanks I got from him "had" to be boiled or they would self-destruct. (But I didnt boil, instead I cut them into smaller pieces.)
I see you are in Nashville. Do you ever get over to the Knoxville area? I have need for an arborist to work on some fruit trees when the season is right. (Besides being no good at that, I'm not allowed to climb anymore, not even a ladder!) I have a tree guy cut where needed but he only cut trees down or trims the limbs I point to with a green laser.)
JKJ
I run into so much great wood to turn that I'm looking for a way to store it in blank form instead of having logs all over the place. The amount of wood I take to the dump (place where they turn it into mulch) is really sad. Other than that, turning green wood is the way to go for sure. I can't address all of the logs I get as I do tree work all day and turn when I find time. ThanksI just have to ask - why? Yeah, yeah, @John K Jordan has filled us in on “wet wood is easy, dry is more challenging”
Perhaps I’m missing something, but it seems to make much more sense to rough turn a wet blank, dramatically reducing the dry time, and much less risk of cracks. I don’t understand waiting 5+ yrs for something to dry that may end up cracking.
I do have some 3-4” squarish, longish spindle Blanks (and smaller), but bigger than that gets roughed wet.
I haven't tried that yet bit it sounds like there are better easels than anchor seal. I'm seeing diluted wood glue but haven't dug in too deep on that yet.
JJ are you trying to dry whole blocks of wood, or rough turned bowl blanks? I assumed one and others apparently read it as the other.
These two quotes are missing one problem and that is the longer the wood stays moist the greater the probability decay. The common terms used by woodturners such as spault, punky, rotten etc. are all just different stages of decay.
There is a problem with adding another coat of Anchorseal (if that's what you mean). Anchorseal is basically an emulsion of wax, water, and a surfactant. When the water dries, the wood is coated with wax and the second coat won't stick and cover well.
I found it better to use thick Anchorseal for the 1st coat - it brushes on easily and when dry the wax is a lot thicker and seals better. I thicken Anchor by simply pouring about an inch or two in a plastic coffee can and leave the lid off for a while (days), stirring occasionally. I think I describe this in the video. A lot of the water evaporates and I put the lid on when the sealer gets thick. I keep a wide, cheap "disposable" paint brush inside the can - use the same brush for years. I usually keep several coffee cans of thickened Anchorseal around. (I bought a 55-gal drum of it long ago, a lot cheaper per gallon - was $6/gal at the time after shipping.) Some clubs do this so members can buy it a lot cheaper.
That said, I DO on occasion seal again after initial drying, but not over the 1st coat. I inspect the drying blanks periodically. If I see a crack developing I cut it away to keep it from getting deeper. Then reseal with the thick Anchorseal. This almost always works since it's the initial drying which is the most risky. I'd far rather have smaller perfect blanks than larger blanks with cracks!
Others have used white glue (not thinned, I think), oil based paint (I read that water will move too quickly through latex). When I researched this long time ago one book recommended aluminum paint. Another said roofing tar was good. Yikes! I haven't tried any of these.
One dealer I know said he sometimes buys big wood, cuts it into blanks, and dips them in a vat of hot paraffin - first one end, then the other. Much imported wood is wet, wet, wet off the boat. The paraffin dip leaves a thick coat of protective wax. When I get such blanks, depending on the size and wood I often let them dry for months or longer (tracking progress by weight) then after the critical period scrape off most off the wax to speed drying.
It's amazing what you can get directly from the importers. I know a woodturner who takes a truck to the coast and buys thick exotic slabs and boards wholesale. When I worked at a college woodworking facility I watched them unload a single piece of mahogany from a rail car. This was over 50 years ago but I remember it being maybe 40' long and 2'x3' in cross section. They stored in a shed then rolled it through a big door cut it into boards when needed on the biggest vertical bandsaw I've ever seen outside a commercial sawmill.
Some green domestic wood local to us is easy to dry successfully - maple, walnut, locust, osage orange, even White/American Ebony (persimmon). Thick blanks of oak or hickory are tricker. Dogwood can go either way, depending on where the blank was cut from the tree. Apple, pear, and other dense fruit woods can warp like crazy. It's hard to get Sassafras to warp or crack! Holly, though, can be tricky - this small sample warped terribly, but didn't crack (that type of twisting is from way the wood was cut relative to the direction of the grain in the tree). You can force boards like this to stay straight if stickered and weighted but risk ending up with internal stresses.
A lot of what I do is based on long experience and experiments, slowly learning what worked and what didn't. I'm not sure of the best way to pass all than on.
I did learn a lot from several good books. I highly recommend "Understanding Wood" by R. Bruce Hoadley. Unlike some technical books and journals I've read, Hoadley is both a wood technologist and a craftsman and includes practical information in language we can all understand!
Oh, there is a way to store green logs or sections indefinetly. But this is getting too long.
JKJ