I have accumulated anchor sealed blanks that have cracked during drying. Also after finishing dried (6-12 months) blanks cracks started to developed. I still have a several cracked blanks. I did not discard any of these yet. I came to the conclusion that the only thing to do with these is to burn them. Before throwing them in the wood stove I tough I ask for comments. What I have learned from this is either its the nature of the beast or I need a controlled environment for drying the blanks properly.
It's BOTH the nature of the beast and you need a controlled environment to dry the blanks properly. There are all kinds of ways to set up a controlled environment and control the movement of moisture in and out of the wood. The best and most highly controllable is a kiln (not solar). That's not practical for most people so they try to take shortcuts such as preventing moisture from escaping too quickly in certain parts of the wood piece. Such procedures include coating the endgrain (anchorseal, peg, wax, endgrain sealer, etc.) and others just act upon the wood piece as a whole (dishwashing soap, freezing, microwaving, diapers, scorching, water, etc.). There's only so much that can be done, even by carefully controlling the drying of the wood in a kiln. Some pieces just won't dry well no matter what steps you take because of factors beyond your control such as internal stresses in the wood itself or decay or structural defects in it.
If these blanks of yours are something you really do want to keep and try to turn (maybe great figure or some other significance to you), you might still be able to turn them. If the cracks don't make the blanks dangerous to turn, just turn it as you normally would and let the cracks be a part of the piece. You can enhance the cracks by filling them with stone or metal powder or just whatever. Lots of things to do to them to make them stand out. If the cracks make it structurally unsound to turn, fill them with an epoxy or some other glue to hold them together (again, stone or metal or whatever can be used at this stage too) while you turn it. Just be careful and check it often to make sure it's still safe to turn. Some great pieces have been created with cracks all over them although some would say to not waste your time with a bad piece of wood (and I think we all know who said that ). There's some truth to that too. There's only so much you can do.
Don't automatically throw them in the fire. Don't automatically try to create something from them. It all depends on what YOU "see" in them and what you can do with them that counts.
On Fri, 2 Apr 2004 07:47:26 -0600, "AHilton" hurled these words of wisdom into the ether:
Just to add a bit more to what Andy said, you can also often salvage choice parts and pieces from cracked blanks, to use for smaller projects, for knobs, inlays, finials and the like, as well as saving pieces for carving, if you're so inclined. I used to buy "craft boxes" of hardwood ends from my local hardwood dealer for $5 for a big box. I got hundreds of projects out of them and still have a lot left, years later, which I use for the things I mentioned above. So, one man's "trash" can indeed be another man's "treasure."
- Chuck *#:^) chaz3913(AT)yahoo(dot)com ANTI-SPAM Sig - Remove NOSPAM from email to reply <
If you, as I, have an endless supply of wood on its way from forest to the furnace, let the failures fulfill their original purpose and warm you. I can see no reason in the world for risking damage to your equipment and injury to yourself for the sake of an ordinary, easily replaceable piece of firewood. If it's a burl or a great gnarly, proceed with caution.
Sometimes we just don't get 'round to roughing out a log until it's too far gone. Those are the breaks. Next year will bring more, so just rough as much as you can, and don't bother trying to save what you can't. Percentage is with roughing and storing the bowl, not the wood.
I've spent the last couple of weeks turning wood I split for the furnace two years ago, because I wanted to do some small stuff. That, and some short pieces of 4/4 stock kicking around the workshop can do some neat items. If I could post to abpw, I would, but if you'd like some suggestions - and this post actually gets out, let me know, and I'll add a page to my personal.
I recently purged my shop of the dozens of cracked blanks because the pile was so big that it was blocking my entry door (forcing me to use the garage door thus loosing a significant amount of heat each time I left the shop). I spent the entire day bandsawing them into spindle blanks. I now have 100's of spindle blanks for various uses.
While I have not tried this myself, we had a Story Stick carver demonstrate at our local woodworking club who said he used Popcorn oil to close up cracks in his sticks caused by drying. Before you just throw them in the fire, or cut them into smaller pieces, it might be worth a try. I believe that all he did was coat the crack with the oil ans it closed.
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