robutacion
Member
Hi peoples,
A few weeks ago I made a series of pen blanks castings and one that seemed to please a lot of you, ,including myself, was the one I made out of the Kurrajong tree pod seeds that I had collected a week prior. I have made a couple of samples, one was a pen blank short the other was a pendant blank and while they were finished immediately, and have the pics taken, only recently I shown the pen blank short, on my 2012 PITH tease thread.
Let me tell you a little about this Kurrajong tree...!
The first time I saw it, not knowing for sure what is was (no pods then...!) was about 2007 when I started using the Medical Practice building, situated in McLaren Vale-SA, for my regular medical check-ups with my private GP Doctor. This is the major town near me (27km away) and one that I keep mentioning all of the time.
On the corner of the buildings back, near the car park, I stared at it for years and wonder what it was, and what sort of wood it had inside but this thing never gave me a dead branch to try and see. In the mean time I started taken some pics and send them to some friends for identification as I was not familiar with this type tree...!
The pods gave it away and the tree was immediately recognised as an Australian Kurrajong tree, a relative of the interesting looking Australian Bottle tree. This year about end of September, I decided to request permission to remove some pods as they looked nice and yellow inside. Little did I know that these damn thinks are like Oysters to open, they show a little gap, just enough for the seeds to fall through when ready but, a very hard job to open apart, any further from that point.
I first collected a large shopping bag full, not that many pods really, as they take a lot of space with all the stokes attached however I got home and started removing the seeds, that when I realised you much of a pain in the A@$$ that was...!
Anyway, I endup with a small container of seeds that looked promising for casting as the bright yellow colours of the outer surface, was pretty. Grabbed a round piece of PVC and packed the seeds on top of each other as compact as I could, mixed some clear PR and pour in till covering the seeds.
The pendant mold was a lid of an empty spray can, with the little pin hole sealed with masking tape and both down in the pressure pot they went for an overnight sleep...!:wink:
Next morning got them out and I saw what I was expecting, little tinny bubbles around the seeds
, why...??? because the seeds were green(ish)/full of moisture when cast. This is just something that you can't get away from, when casting anything that isn't dry properly or moisture free however the possibility, I want to see it the seeds would get affected by the resin and how they would look inside after casting.
The first thing I noticed as soon as the seeds got in contact with the resin was that, the pretty yellow skin surface went away and became a brownish colour, instead. I later find out that soaking in anything, including water, the yellow darkens considerably and that was a real shame, I thought...!
The other thing that I was to finding was, how much shrinking the seeds would have after casting as I was not sure at what stage of maturity the seeds were when I first got them so, I waited for that shrinkage but that didn't seemed that was going to happen by them was 4 weeks later and looking into the container where I had the other seeds, I noticed that they looked a little more shrivelled up on the outer skin so opening a few I realise that, the rest of the seeds were starting to change colour inside, sign that they were starting to died of and decompose into a brown colour.
Caught by surprised, I decided to go and get as many pods as I could before the seeds were no good, come home hours later with nearly 4 nylon full bags that are about 4' tall...!
Poor wife got a bashing with seeds removal from those nasty tight pods for a couple of days, she was glad when the last bag was empty, I helped here and there but, she done most of them.
I sorted and clean them, many never made it and I couldn't believe how small container I had from all the 4 bags (about 3 black dishes/containers as the one shown if the pic, ridiculous...!
The first half of them were put in the oven @ 100°C for a couple of yours to dry any moisture 
and cast that same evening into various colours
, the rest was done the following days.
Now, these blanks are not for the "faint hearted" they require much care and attention when worked, the seeds have 3 layers 2 of them hard shells, these don't allow any sort of soaking, even with the Cactus Juice so, the seeds or part of, tend to flick off when turning.
The trick is NOT use too high lathe speed, CA soaking as you got and sharp tools. I also recommend that the blank should be wrapped with masking tape from the moment you decided to start working on it. From cutting to drilling in particular, the tape helps to keep everything together, until is time to start turning, the tape will come out after a couple of passes...!
Now, what is the best way to fix a seed that come off and left a big whole...??? CA soaking as you go, minimises the chances of that happen but if it does, any blanks that will be sold will have a small bag with 3 or 4 seeds in it, they are for there, just in case.
Starting turning these blanks with your lathe and working areas clean, is your best chance to find the bit that flew off, CA will glue it back and you carry on but, if the bit can't be found, no problems one of the spare seeds will fix that whole and a couple more if necessary, as this is what I suggest you should do...!
A little extra time and care, can go a long way with these type of blanks, in my opinion, well worth it...!
Next year, I will need to remember that, the pods have to be collected at the end of September, the latest, this should provide a lot more seeds with the pure white inside however, they will have lots of extra moisture that I have to dry off, some how. They will need also to be cast as soon as the moisture is removed, if not, nature will take its course and the seeds will die off and darken...!:frown:
Well, I think that I have covered pretty much the whole "event" and provided valued information about this seed species, some of its uses and how to handle it, I like what they do/look in resin, I hope you do to...!:wink::biggrin:
Enjoy...!
Cheers
George
A few weeks ago I made a series of pen blanks castings and one that seemed to please a lot of you, ,including myself, was the one I made out of the Kurrajong tree pod seeds that I had collected a week prior. I have made a couple of samples, one was a pen blank short the other was a pendant blank and while they were finished immediately, and have the pics taken, only recently I shown the pen blank short, on my 2012 PITH tease thread.
Let me tell you a little about this Kurrajong tree...!
The first time I saw it, not knowing for sure what is was (no pods then...!) was about 2007 when I started using the Medical Practice building, situated in McLaren Vale-SA, for my regular medical check-ups with my private GP Doctor. This is the major town near me (27km away) and one that I keep mentioning all of the time.
On the corner of the buildings back, near the car park, I stared at it for years and wonder what it was, and what sort of wood it had inside but this thing never gave me a dead branch to try and see. In the mean time I started taken some pics and send them to some friends for identification as I was not familiar with this type tree...!
The pods gave it away and the tree was immediately recognised as an Australian Kurrajong tree, a relative of the interesting looking Australian Bottle tree. This year about end of September, I decided to request permission to remove some pods as they looked nice and yellow inside. Little did I know that these damn thinks are like Oysters to open, they show a little gap, just enough for the seeds to fall through when ready but, a very hard job to open apart, any further from that point.
I first collected a large shopping bag full, not that many pods really, as they take a lot of space with all the stokes attached however I got home and started removing the seeds, that when I realised you much of a pain in the A@$$ that was...!
Anyway, I endup with a small container of seeds that looked promising for casting as the bright yellow colours of the outer surface, was pretty. Grabbed a round piece of PVC and packed the seeds on top of each other as compact as I could, mixed some clear PR and pour in till covering the seeds.
The pendant mold was a lid of an empty spray can, with the little pin hole sealed with masking tape and both down in the pressure pot they went for an overnight sleep...!:wink:
Next morning got them out and I saw what I was expecting, little tinny bubbles around the seeds
, why...??? because the seeds were green(ish)/full of moisture when cast. This is just something that you can't get away from, when casting anything that isn't dry properly or moisture free however the possibility, I want to see it the seeds would get affected by the resin and how they would look inside after casting.The first thing I noticed as soon as the seeds got in contact with the resin was that, the pretty yellow skin surface went away and became a brownish colour, instead. I later find out that soaking in anything, including water, the yellow darkens considerably and that was a real shame, I thought...!
The other thing that I was to finding was, how much shrinking the seeds would have after casting as I was not sure at what stage of maturity the seeds were when I first got them so, I waited for that shrinkage but that didn't seemed that was going to happen by them was 4 weeks later and looking into the container where I had the other seeds, I noticed that they looked a little more shrivelled up on the outer skin so opening a few I realise that, the rest of the seeds were starting to change colour inside, sign that they were starting to died of and decompose into a brown colour.
Caught by surprised, I decided to go and get as many pods as I could before the seeds were no good, come home hours later with nearly 4 nylon full bags that are about 4' tall...!
Poor wife got a bashing with seeds removal from those nasty tight pods for a couple of days, she was glad when the last bag was empty, I helped here and there but, she done most of them.
I sorted and clean them, many never made it and I couldn't believe how small container I had from all the 4 bags (about 3 black dishes/containers as the one shown if the pic, ridiculous...!
The first half of them were put in the oven @ 100°C for a couple of yours to dry any moisture and cast that same evening into various colours, the rest was done the following days.Now, these blanks are not for the "faint hearted" they require much care and attention when worked, the seeds have 3 layers 2 of them hard shells, these don't allow any sort of soaking, even with the Cactus Juice so, the seeds or part of, tend to flick off when turning.
The trick is NOT use too high lathe speed, CA soaking as you got and sharp tools. I also recommend that the blank should be wrapped with masking tape from the moment you decided to start working on it. From cutting to drilling in particular, the tape helps to keep everything together, until is time to start turning, the tape will come out after a couple of passes...!
Now, what is the best way to fix a seed that come off and left a big whole...??? CA soaking as you go, minimises the chances of that happen but if it does, any blanks that will be sold will have a small bag with 3 or 4 seeds in it, they are for there, just in case.
Starting turning these blanks with your lathe and working areas clean, is your best chance to find the bit that flew off, CA will glue it back and you carry on but, if the bit can't be found, no problems one of the spare seeds will fix that whole and a couple more if necessary, as this is what I suggest you should do...!
A little extra time and care, can go a long way with these type of blanks, in my opinion, well worth it...!
Next year, I will need to remember that, the pods have to be collected at the end of September, the latest, this should provide a lot more seeds with the pure white inside however, they will have lots of extra moisture that I have to dry off, some how. They will need also to be cast as soon as the moisture is removed, if not, nature will take its course and the seeds will die off and darken...!:frown:
Well, I think that I have covered pretty much the whole "event" and provided valued information about this seed species, some of its uses and how to handle it, I like what they do/look in resin, I hope you do to...!:wink::biggrin:
Enjoy...!
Cheers
George
Last edited:
