Recommendations for wood selection

G'day folks,

I've tried my hand at some basic involute turning with scrapwood and now I'd like to turn a demo piece, a "construction aid" if you will, which could be used in a classroom to demonstrate how it is jointed without needing binoculars. Grain patterns & figuring, etc. are not desired, this'll be a much abused knock-around item and I'd rather it's aesthetics to be in the form rather than the timber anyway.

So, I'm after two contrasting woods, preferably with similar turning characteristics when cured and that rules out most of the timbers local to me as the lighter coloured timbers are generally softwoods here. The few suitable ones I've found are as, if not more, expensive than many imports and the budget is very limited. I've been looking at various characteristic tables but few include any form of pricing guesstimates and many species are unfamiliar to me, thus leaving me none the wiser.

In the hope that cheap, readily available timber in whatever country you're in equates to cheaper imports at this end, does anyone care to offer suggestions for "matched" woods?

- Andy

Reply to
Andy McArdle
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Andy McArdle wrote: snip

Air dried walnut and poplar. YMMV. Dave in Fairfax

Reply to
Dave in Fairfax

Hmmm... I'm sure I have some Black Walnut & maybe some English (Persian) Walnut curing out back (must be time to weigh 'em in!) but no poplar. I'm guessing you mean an aspen (for the colour) rather than a balsam or cottonwood? Are they all much the same, turning wise?

- Andy

Reply to
Andy McArdle

He probably means Liriodendron tulipifera, a member of the magnolia family sold as tulip poplar, yellow poplar, or just poplar.

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True poplars, like aspen are stringier, almost bulletproof in drying from a rough, and lack the greenish color tulip poplar can have.
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My favorite, because in both Greek and French, it's called "tree of women's tongues" because the shape of the leaf makes it wag constantly. There's also bigtooth, P balsamifera and the family members you mentioned - cottonwood/willow

Reply to
George

Common British heritage. Don't you have your own "robin" down there, too?

A bit of nostalgia for the old country has given us a lot of common-name misleads.

Reply to
George

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