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Western broadleaf maple suitability

I have a big Western broadleaf maple that needs to come down before it falls on my neighbor's Dawn Redwood. What I'd like to know is if I should try to save some larger pieces for turning or if firewood is the best use for it. It's probably 10 inches thick at the butt and is growing curved from the base and leaning a bit towards my neighbor's tree (hence the problem). Thus, the tree is largely composed of reaction wood. Is the stressed nature of the grain going to cause me big problems? Is Western brodleaf worth turning? If not bowls, how about handles? Do I need to soak it in LDD first?

Thanks

Reply to
Hitch
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Reply to
David Wade

Reaction wood is anathema to standard woodworkers, but the grail for turners. You do need to be perhaps a touch more generous in your dry-to-turn roughs, as you can't predict warp as precisely. But that means the warp-and-go thin green turnings can do some strange, and possibly wonderful things, too. Of course, their idea of wonderful may not necessarily coincide with yours.

You may feel better for fussing, but I have no idea why LDD should work, and do not experience significant failure rates in my turnings, so I don't bother.

How is it you're posting through a German server?

Reply to
George

Hitch, I live in the Puget Sound area of Washington where about all we have is Big leaf maple. I've turned alot of it green. My best luck has been to turn it to final thickness with either a spigot for the chuck or a glued on waste block using "ProBond" or "Gorilla Glue", don't use Titebond II, and then soak it in a 50/50 mix of LDD for a week. Then remount and sand through 320. Put on two layers of oil and bag in a paperbag for two weeks. Then if dry, do final sanding through 400 and a tung oil finish. The stressed grain should give you some nice "quilting". The last piece of maple was a salad bowl 15" in diameter and 6" deep. It had slight distortion after all sanding and finishing but nothing major. Good luck Roger

Reply to
Roger

Thanks for the advice.

I'm posting through a German server because it's free from where my computer is right now. My home service (Comcast cable) won't allow me to even browse the ng from anywhere but home, and Google Groups web-based interface is too clunky. This news server from Germany allows me to use OE or Mozilla (my favorite at this time), allows me to post messages, and posts my messages quickly.

Reply to
Hitch

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