Maple Rough Out

[Quinn McCarthy]

Zoiks Steve that is a monster destined for the monster.

Q

[Ron Erickson]

Steve use the plastic bag to soak it in. Just make a nest in a box useing the shavings, takes a lot less DNA.

[Jim Burr]

That had to hurt! You should have a "How many M&M's in the vase" contest!

[Rob Cunningham]

That's quite a chunk of wood to be carrying down the steps. Glad to see you're giving the Beauty a good workout.

[Mike Goetzke]

Mike - that is a chuck plate that was designed and built by Jerry Marcantel. He wrote an article - posted on the Sawmill Creek Home Page - on how to build your own. Check it out here: Chuck Plate

Steve - thanks for the link. Saved me a few $, I was ready to buy a face plate. I have an additional question on the linked plate. Why don't you just drive the plate into one end of the piece and then chuck it up?

Mike

[philip labre]

Steve, I really like these large pieces you've been turning on the new lathe! I have some nice sized butternut I keep wanting to bring up to you, but just no time. I think the color of the butternut would work well with these styles and hopefully I'll have time to at least bring some with to a meeting.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Mike - that is exactly what I did. Check out the very first photo and you can see the chuck plate is being held by my Talon chuck.

[Nate Davey]

That is awesome Steve, totally jealous here.

[Bruce Pratt]

Steve,

Curious why you didn't turn to final. With the grain orientation, I wouldn't think there would be very much asymmetric warping, and the pointed base should minimize pith-associated cracking.
-----------
Bruce

[David DeCristoforo]

Funny thing about this... in the first pic, the log looks huge. But in the next pic, the form does not appear to be anywhere's close in size to the capacity of this lathe. Obviously the form would appear smaller but I know you didn't remove that much material. Maybe it's just an illusion created by the angle. I was also looking closer at the figure in the last pic and there is some really sweet movement in the grain.

[charlie knighton]

thanks for the pictures, look forward to your progress with this piece

[Faust M. Ruggiero]

Steve,
That's a big chunk of wood to spin with a Talon. Maybe it's time to begin thinking about a Stronghold. Meanwhile, turning such a big piece of wood has to be fun. By the way, I bought a small Brute garbage can for soaking my big bowls. I also bought dolly to move it around the shop. When I want to make sure it is airtight I wrap stretch wrap around the lid and top of the container.
faust

[Pat Scott]

I like your lathe.

Looks to me like you need a bigger chuck though!

So "DNA" just means Denatured Alcohol? What is the purpose of soaking in alcohol, what does the alcohol do? I'll take a guess that the alcohol absorbs or dries the moisture in the wood and is to prevent cracking? Or does it just speed up the drying process?

[Joe Meirhaeghe]

Steve, glad to see your working your way up to some larger work. I've been wanting to see you do this for a long time. I do understand that having to carry logs down a stair case can be a big problem though. I know my back wouldn't hold up to carrying 100lb plus logs anywhere, no less a flight of stairs.
This piece appears to be pretty straight grained with out any large knots so I do believe you could have roughed turned it down to about a 1/2" thick and still had plenty of wood left to do a finish turning to about of about 3/16" thick or so. I have had better luck air drying green rough outs ( less cracking problems) if I rough turn to about 1/2".
Good luck with the drying & I'm looking forward to seeing the finished piece.

[Kathy Marshall]

Now that's a bigun! It's going to look great when it's finished!