I was wondering if there is any difference between turning above ground wood and root wood. Assuming that the root material has been cleaned and trimmed.
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Turning roots
- Thread starter David A Morris
- Start date
My experience is root wood acts a lot like burl with crazy grain and a lot of knots. It can give you some really nice looking wood.
Dave Landers
Beta Tester
It's wood.
Can have weird grain (can be nice, burl-like). Strange branching sometimes. Dirt. gravel, rocks (see pic) embedded in the roots.
Can have weird grain (can be nice, burl-like). Strange branching sometimes. Dirt. gravel, rocks (see pic) embedded in the roots.
You might search messages for "root" or "roots". I've seen messages and have written about roots myself.
Roots can have amazing figure. look at this rhododendron root in the middle and bottom photos:
Box elder can have some wonderful color in the roots, more than in the trunk. However like most wood the color slowly fades.
Wood from manzanita root balls is hard and fine grained, can be incredibly figured. Watch out for the embedded rocks.
I've had roots from several trees that had incredible figure. Again, watch for embedded rocks and dirt. Before I cut up any root I use a pressure washer to removed dirt.
Root wood is sometimes burled. This wood was at the roots of a white oak tree:
And I got some amazing spalted dogwood from roots of a dead dogwood tree cut down years ago. I dug it up with a backhoe.
JKJ
I stopped working root balls and roots when I hit a paving brick in a root ball with my chainsaw. It was totally encased in wood with no hint of it being there. So rocks and sand will also be hidden. Oh yeah, a paving brick will actually remove chain teeth. Imbedded materials are always a hazard. I’ve cut through steel bars and even a piece of black pipe with a street T on it. Higher chance of termites and carpenter ants too. Urban trees increase the likelihood by a huge amount!
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