From oak tree to blanks?

[wortmanb]

This weekend, I had to have a beautiful oak tree cut down in the woods behind my house. It had grown at a gentle curve and was leaning dangerously and while the crew and climber were here cutting down three distressed (read: hollowed by carpenter ants & termites) trees I had them fell this one too.

The oak is in great shape and they left it in roughly 4' sections for me. It's quite wide near the bottom but I haven't done a thorough inventory to figure out how much I'm dealing with just yet.

Here's the question: how do I go about turning this tree into bowl blanks and possibly pen blanks (though I don't expect much interesting grain, really)? If I section it into bowl blanks now and protect the end grain with a sealer, my fear is that storage will become an issue while it's drying. Can I leave it in large logs for a while and dry it outdoors under a tarp? Or should I go ahead, section it up, and store it in the basement and garage to dry as best it can?

Thanks!

 

[robutacion]

Well, my advice is, if storing outside is not a big drama for now, get a good pallet and keep the logs as long as possible, the 4' is a good size to store on a pallet unless they are a few feet wide and you don't have the equipment to handle its weight, that's why pics are a must in these cases (we all like pics).

Why leaving the logs long...?? because you will lose about 1" to 3" of each end due to cracking, if sealed (exterior acrylic paint is good) it may crack less and deeper but, surface cracks spoil the logs ends in 90% of cases (depending on wood type).

So, you paint/seal the ends and store it above ground (pallet) and then cover it with a tarpolin, the wood will still breath and drip from the pallet end.

What you should do is to select some logs/pieces that you want to process straight away, those are the pen blanks cut at 1" square and 1/4" longer that the size you want then when dry, after cut stack them as the ones in my pic here or your you take the time to strap them as I did here you can use wire, strong string, anything that has little stretch. One of the big advantages of having them strapped (call then drying towers) is that, if you knock them they will not fall everywhere, making start all over again and, you can always move them from one place to the other without any problems...!

Being strapped also, keep the wood from twisting buckling too much. :wink::biggrin:

So, now that you have pen blanks drying (should be ready in 6 months or less, depending of temps...!) you can concentrated of the bowl blanks and the best way is to cut the log a little over than its outside diameter, then slip/cut in in half, you now have 2 bowl blanks ready to either seal (end -grains only) or mark and cut them round on the bandsaw/chainsaw.

If you want to keep them in the half log form, seal the ends and store under cover, if you want to removed the excess wood and store only the rounds, round then and then seal them with wax all around (paint will do) and about 1" over on the edge of the flat surfaces.

The other option and the one that will take the less storage room and also allow you to have blanks ready to finish in a few months is to rough turn the green round blanks leaving about 1" thickness all around, use some sealant if you want (I use Fungishield here in Australia), a couple of coats and put them away to dry in a protected environment.

This process will make a lot of shavings and will keep you busy for a few days but, you can turn 1 tonne of green wood very quickly and store the results in a small area, many, many times smaller than the space you would need to store the logs/half logs...!

With the wood piled on the pallet, when you know you are going to have a few good sunny days, take the cover off and let the logs get a little of light/sunshine, that will help considerably...!

I hope this is of some help to you...!

Good luck,
Cheers
George

 

[wortmanb]

Ta, George!

I lived in the Red Centre for almost 5 years. Made many trips to Adelaide along the way, usually with a pregnant wife to buy nursery & baby gear! Really miss the place.

I'll take some measurements & pictures here shortly and let you know how I'm going.

 

[wortmanb]

Curtis gave me some advice at the MAPG that to help this wood spalt (and lend it some intrigue since it's otherwise fairly ordinary Virginia oak), to stand the logs up on end on the ground and then cover the tops with dirt and let them stand like that for a while, checking every week or so.

Here's the results of the afternoon's exertions. I still need to give them their "dirt caps", but hey, most are standing up at least. And some of them look to have some interesting crotch grain too... I definitely see some bowls in my future!