Drying roughed bowls

Winter rules might be the culprit. Colder outside air holds less total moisture, which means low relative humidity when heated in the house. I leave my uncoated stuff in the open at 65% or greater RH with maybe one in fifty a loss.

Put your pieces in a cool indoor place with newspaper tents over them to keep the local RH high. Check after a few days and see what's happening. Paper bags work, too.

That said, are you sure you didn't turn with cracks in the work to begin with? Lots of times the cracks in firewood will close at high RH.

Shows stress cracks in the heart of hard maple. They're not always as obvious, though. Wipe with mineral spirits and see if you have some. They'll draw the spirits in by capillary action and be fairly obvious.

Here are a couple of links that may help. Seems there are as many ways to dry without cracking as there are turners, but boiling per Steven Russell's protocol seems to work best statistically.

Never did find the original article, perhaps you'll have better luck. His company is called Eurowood Werks.

As many people told you when you first asked, including myself, Chestnut in the UK do an end sealer available in 5 litre containers.

As many people told you when you first asked, including myself

Chestnut in the UK do an end sealer available in 5 litre containers.

I have had real good luck so far with the dishwashing soap method on side grain bowls. I have not lost any yet. I have soaked overnight and finished the next day and I have soaked and allowed a week of drying before finishing. I must say I have had poor luck with using the same method on end grain. I have not tried yet to completely finish end grain stuff the next day. I have only tried 3 end grain (with pith left in) and allowed to dry for several days. All 3 cracked beyond use.

I do use the anchorseal method also. I have heard that a good coating of wax on the end grain will work just as well. You might want to give that a try.

Dave

Hello to the group,

If anyone is interested in my boiling protocol, I will be happy to email it to them if you will send me an email. I would post it on the group, but some on the group do not care for posts that are more than a few sentences long. I still do not have a website as yet, but I'm trying to get one up by early '06. Plans are to include some of my latest research on the website, as I have only published 10% of my total research in the last ten years.

I have boiled more than 10,000 bowls using my boiling protocol and it works very well indeed. Losses per thousand bowls are less than 1/2 of 1%, with many species reporting 100% success rates. I have been contacted by some South American mills who have been using my boiling protocol to boil solid exotic wood bowl blanks and other solid stock with superb results.

One even mentioned that they would probably be out of business if it were not for my protocol, as their losses due to checking were so high. In addition, thousands of woodturners in virtually every country in the world are using my protocol with the same results. It works, if you follow the protocol correctly and this has been verified by woodturners around the world. I have a new boiling protocol that uses a pre-shock cycle, prior to boiling that I will publish the protocol on very soon. I like to run at least 500 bowls through a new protocol before publishing the results, as I believe less than this is not really a valid test group.

In addition, I have begun experimenting on two new ways to dry timber using some new innovative techniques. Results for these will not be available until the end of 2006, or early 2007 as each subset will require 500 bowls, with the master protocol requiring a total of 2,000 bowls to complete the testing. As always, I remain at the group's service... If I can help you in any way, please do not hesitate to contact me. Research and testing continue... Humm, I see my post is a wee bit long, I guess I'll have to hunker down for the incoming :-0

Well, I'd suggest dropping those people in your spam filter and posting away Steve, since your posts are/have been one of the best bits of reading here. And any of those people should drop you (and me) into their spam filters and then go back to watching soap opera's...

Hi Steve

Love to see your results on your drying experiments, I have your boiling file and though I rarely use the boiling way on my turnings I do use it for some woods that I know are going to give me trouble.

I am interested, like to know things and it gives me choices, thank You

Have fun and take care Leo Van Der Loo

Steve Russell wrote:

====>Steve: Didn't you also say that you were going to run a study on LDD?

Leif

Yeah, da noive a' dose guys makin' wid da complaints against our great guru. We all wants ta hear what youse gots to say, Steve, so let 'er rip. If any a dem guys complains, Vinnie and Vito may have ta pay dem a visit, just a social call you understand....

I'm waiting for the DVD. Nothing more exciting than watching a boiling pot of wood. Then we can take it to the next level - boil it in LDD!

...Kevin

If you like Steve, I'd be happy to put the study up on my web page (with all due credit of course). It's nothing fancy, but for a bunch of text and maybe some photos it wouldn't be much work to make it at least presentable until you can find time to make your own site...

...Kevin

Hello,

Thanks for the kind words. I'm just getting back from a demo in Dallas, please accept my apologies for the late reply. Sometimes you can't adequately explain something in a few sound bites. Those favouring short posts would not want me posting the results of my experiments to reduce/eliminate ultraviolet degradation and related colour loss in wood via TTD's and H.A.L.S.'s. I would guess the gross material would come in around

450,000 - 500,000 words. :-) Best wishes to you and yours for a safe and Happy Holiday Season! Take care.

Hello Leo,

I will keep the group posted. I'm always looking for new ways to increase the efficiency of the overall woodturning process. As you so eloquently said, it gives you choices! Bets wishes to you and yours for a safe and Happy Holiday Season! Take care.

Hello Leif,

Yes indeed... It's still underway and the results should be available in late Spring, '06. As I mentioned, I like to have a minimum of 500 bowls in each test, with some requiring more, based on the preset objectives and goals of the testing.

For the LDD test>

Hello Mike,

Thanks for the post, I'm laughing so hard it's hard to type.... :-) Take care and best wishes to you and yours for a safe and Happy Holiday Season!

If anyone knows Steve then you know how good a turner he is. Steve travels with the Woodworking Shows as well as running a professional turning shop in California. Take advantage of his DVDs to learn techniques. I have seen him several times in Portland and don't miss an opportunity to watch him turn when he comes.

Bob Darrah West Linn, Oregon

Hello Kevin,

Thanks for the offer... If I can't get my website up and running soon, I will take you up on it. :-) Take care and all the best to you and yours!