Burl virgin needs advise

[Alan Tolchinsky]

Hi All,

This myrtle burl has been sitting around for a few years and is about 11" diam. and 2.5" min thickness on one side and 6" on the other. What would you do with this burl. Since I've never worked with a burl before I'm stumped on what to make with it. I've done lots of bowls and some hollow forms though. Any suggestions appreciated. Thanks.

trying to upload some pics

[David E Keller]

It's always tough enough for me to figure out what to do with a piece of wood when I'm holding it... It's even harder from photos. These pieces with sloped tops lend themselves well to hollow forms with voids, but then again, I try to see that kind of form in just about every piece of wood I touch.

If wood near the cut surface on the tall side of the piece is rather plain, you can alway start it between centers with the natural surface perpendicular to the ways... That would leave you with a form roughly 2.5 to 3 inch deep and a balanced natural edge.

Of those two options, I'm leaning toward the HF with void, but I doubt that surprises anyone.

[Scott Hackler]

You may not like to hear this suggestion, but because of its size in diameter... I might be tempted to 1/3 the whole thing and make a HF from the tallest side and 2 stemmed cups from the rest. The only other option woud be a 10 1/2" diameter NE bowl with a possible void on one side. With three pieces, you wouldn't have a bunch of nice shavings laying on the floor like the bowl operation would have.

[Alan Tolchinsky]

Thanks David and Scott, some good ideas there. Yes, it would be hard to cut up this baby but maybe that would be best. If you were going to do a bowl from this how would you mount it? I'm thinking between centers then cut a spigot for the chuck. I would think you'd face the smooth face toward the headstock. Make sense?

[David Reed]

Not sure of the features and orientation in this piece but in my BLM burl, the 'rays' are vertical and I try to maximize the horizontal lines of the finish piece. That is exposing the ends of the rays. Here is a piece representative of several I have turned to show off the burl-esque features plus it reduces waste in a piece with this shape - kind of a squashed sand bag effect. A smaller neck also works well.
Best of luckIMG_0590 (Large).jpg

[neil mackay]

Well for me when the shape is similar and or difficult. I aim at creating the biggest HV as I can with the final shape quite close to the original blank