How dry is dry?

I don't own a moisture meter either. I believe what you are looking for is an average between 6% to 12% moisture content but without a meter, you'll never know! I usually use the weighing method. I rough turn my bowls and let them dry either on a shelf or in a paper bag if I want to slow down the drying process a bit to minimize cracking. After a few weeks, I weigh the piece and record the date and weight. Back it goes on the shelf and I do it again after a few days and record the changes. Depending on the size, shape, thickness, etc, after a while, the weight stays the same. I then leave it for a few days more and weigh it again. If there has been no change within a month, I consider the wood to have reached an equilibrium and THAT is what I am looking for. Numbers are great but they are all relative which is why nobody can place a specific value on the dryness required, they are all margins between this and that, based on species and whether you live in the rain forest or not!

As to your refrigerator, any enclosure will work to dry wood providing you can control ambiant temperature and proper air circulation. A fridge is kind of small so if you are using a bulb to provide the heat, a small wattage is probably what you want. Either way, fridge or no fridge, a scale will tell you all you need to know.

When you have a moment to peruse the 2000+ replies, do a search for "dry wood" on this site. There's some really good stuff in there from people that are way more knowledgeable than I am.

Works for me.

Mike Courteau snipped-for-privacy@toymakersite.com

Wood is dry relatively - depending on relative humidity of the environment. Wood loses and gains bulk with moisture loss and gain, so it'll always move. The wood can take a "set" if you overdry it, so if you're up to the risk, you can do that, and minimize subsequent range of movement.

If you have a hygrometer, and they're cheap, you can monitor the RH and use the tables in

chapter three to see what the moisture content by weight really is. Equilibrium is indicated by no weight change, but also depends on no change in the RH. While you're reading, take a look at the average shrinkage values for the various species of wood. It's a good indicator of when you need to take the first weight. You can also use them to cut your time to equilibrium by gaming the grain and contour and how thin you cut, as long as you're pretty satisfied with the shape you've given to the rough piece. One piece of information to keep in mind is that the tables are based on shrinkage from the FSP of about 30% moisture to oven dry, or zero. You'll get about two thirds the average figures on most configurations, because you're only going to around 10%. Note another reality, which is that wood contracts on itself, so cutting with a broad bottom and nearly vertical sides will give you more shrink, and more shrink stress than cutting with a narrower bottom and sloped sides.

Adding heat in a closed, or nearly closed environment will effectively lower the relative humidity, because warm air can carry more volume of water. It will also energize the process of unbonding, the release of water held by hydrogen bonds to the wood itself. If you're going to use heat and enclosure, I suggest that you spin things up to eject as much unbound water as possible centrifugally, and even blow compressed air through to eject more. This will get you to and through the FSP more rapidly, because the minimum ventilation won't have to dilute and carry away so much water.

See

and download the Excel spreadsheet on that page. It'll help you determine the target temp and humidity level to get your wood to a given EMC point. HTH...

...Kevin

JD I just take the "more is better" approach to the issue, which is another way of saying I prefer to rough a bowl rather than finish turn. So I have a stack of stuff that is every where from a couple of months to a few years old on the drying stacks. By the time I get around to finish turning a bowl blank, I has been on the shelf for at least a year so I figure it is as dry as it will get. For a hobby turner like me, a hundred bowls or so ahead will make sure I have a dry blank or three just waiting.

I got the following,

testing suggests it is easily worth the money

Hi JD

No moisture meter here either, I'm just not interested to see how quickly I can get dry cracked and split turnings, just for trying to speed the drying up.

My biggest concern is to keep whole what I just made, and that involves more the slowing down of the drying rather than speeding it up, especially in the initial first few weeks, after that I just let it dry out in my cabin or in the shop, I trust my feeling of the wood, if it is dry or not.

Also, unless it is a lidded box, the little changing of the shape of a bowl does hardly ever matter if even at all visible.

Not only that, but it will change shape as air moisture changes in its environment, over the course of its life.

Enjoy the turning of the wood and don't be so much in a rush to get it done, slow down, things do need time to get done right.

Have fun and take care Leo Van Der Loo