Spalted Sweetgum hollow form

[Dennis Peacock]

Well Travis.....everybody's already said all the stuff I could say.

Very nice and I love the spalting in this piece. Excellently done sir.

[Cody Colston]

Travis, I've turned some Sweetgum and even had some spalt but it was nothing like yours. That's absolutely stunning.

Would you elaborate on how you treated the wood to get that effect?

[Robert Mickley]

Travis, I can't even find the right words to describe it. So absolutely stunning will have to do

[Travis Stinson]

Travis, I've turned some Sweetgum and even had some spalt but it was nothing like yours. That's absolutely stunning.

Would you elaborate on how you treated the wood to get that effect?

Sorry Cody, I got caught up in all the excitement yesterday.
I split the log, removing the pith, and sealed one end with Anchorseal. Then stood it on end with the unsealed end on the ground in a shady spot behind my shop for a few months. The unsealed end looked like something out of John Hart's laboratory when I took it to the bandsaw, but this is what was inside.

[Chris Barton]

Absolutely stunning Travis! Nice work with the 80 grit gouge.

[Cody Colston]

Sorry Cody, I got caught up in all the excitement yesterday.
I split the log, removing the pith, and sealed one end with Anchorseal. Then stood it on end with the unsealed end on the ground in a shady spot behind my shop for a few months. The unsealed end looked like something out of John Hart's laboratory when I took it to the bandsaw, but this is what was inside.

Thanks. I go home today and I'm gonna do the exact same thing you did. hopefully in a few months, I'll have some similar stunning Sweetgum.

[Bill Hunt]

Travis, Is that from the big sweetgum I cut? It's really stunning! I cut another one down Wednesday and got a lot of blanks from it.
Sandy says it time to stop collecting wood and turn some bowls.

I've got some intersting Black Walnut from the tree we cut in Dec. I'm bringing the trailer load to the March meeting.

Bill Hunt

[Christopher Pine]

What everyone else said.. That is just a wonderfully attractive piece...
Great wood and great shape to the piece..
Anways congrats!

Chris

[Travis Stinson]

Hey Bill! Good to see you around here. This was from one I cut around here. I'm looking forward to getting ahold of some of that Walnut . I told them to make sure to schedule cutting the next one on a weekend!
I think you need to listen to Sandy and give that PM a workout! We need another PM man in here to keep Andy in line.
See you in March or at the next cutting.

[Carole Valentine]

Travis, that is one of the most spectacular pieces of spalted wood I have ever seen! Your form certainly does it justice. Do you have a "recipe" for getting that kind of spalting or is it just purely Mom Nature?

[Kyle Woodrome]

Can I bring this back from the past!?

My question : is there any new info on how to prevent tear out? Or is what I read here about poly gel or maybe a oil..(like walnut oil) let set a bit and try to turn?


Solid work there Travis.

I looked up sweet gum bowls and stumbled on this..

very hesitant to work with sweet gum..
However from my experience. Cookies and or the few bowls I turned.. cracking was surprisingly min.


I have had some sweet gum logs drying in my solar kiln.. just because I had no where to put them lol. It’s been a year lol.

They are light weight… hard and dry now… and come to find out they have light spalting..

[David Walser]

Kyle -- There's nothing new to prevent tear out. The recipe remains the same: Use sharp tools, cut in the right direction, use a bevel-supported cut where possible; where not possible to use a bevel-supported cut; use a negative rake scraper to make very light cuts. If all that fails, lubricate the cut with wax, finishing oil, or even water. You can also try to stiffen the wood fibers with sanding sealer, CA glue, thinned wood glue, etc. Finally, you can turn the wood into plastic by stabilizing it with Cactus Juice (or similar) or Minwax High Performance Wood Hardener. The problem with stiffening or stabilizing the wood fibers is that these steps will affect the way the wood takes finish.

HTH

[Dave Mount]

Spalted wood is often punky and tearout prone. David is right about potential issues for differential finishing consequences if you stabilize with CA glue or other treatments. I handle this by turning to close to final dimension and using shear scraping to get the tearout in punky spots down to as little as possible. Then I soak punky areas with CA glue. I try to really soak the punky areas and keep it off other wood as best I can; some will run over non punky areas, I just try to avoid soaking those areas. After CA is set, make finishing cuts. The idea is to cut away the solid wood that got CA on it but didn't soak in deeply, but don't cut below the CA in the punky areas, which take up CA more readily and deeply. The CA will change the way the punky wood takes up finish, but punky wood will finish differently anyway. In my experience, CA soaking punky wood often reduces the difference relative to solid wood,, but it depends on the wood, condition, finish, etc.

Best,

Dave