Use of Anchorseal

[Tom Lewis]

I have used Anchorseal off and on for quite a while now.
Most of the time I don't use it. I just rough turn a bowl, put it in a paper bag, check it everyday and put CA on any cracks that start to develope.
I just got some highly figured ash wood and have decided to put Anchorseal on all the rough turned bowls I make.
My question is, do you recomend putting the anchorsealed bowl in a paper bag or leave the paper bag off, and just set the anchorsealed bowl in a cool place?

[Bernie Weishapl]

Tom I have had excellent luck anchorsealing the whole bowl and I store it on the floor in a cool place. I do not bag it. It is in a unheated room in my shop building which stays around 64 to 66 degrees near the floor. Knock on wood (pun intended) I have about 30 bowls that way and not one has a crack. I talked with Mike Mahoney at a demo of his about this because he showed how he did this on his DVD's. He stores his in is basement that he says stays at 65 deg. Of course he says he has somewhere around 100 to 200 bowls drying. He did say if you are in a hurry this is not the way. Previously I had been using DNA soaking.

[Steve Mawson]

If the blank is really wet I seal the end grain and bag. If not real wet I just bag. So far so good. They are left in the garage which gets hot in the summer and stays between 35-40 in the winter unless I have the heat on. This is the method I got from Bill Grumbine's video.

[Donny Lawson]

I've not done that many but the ones I have done has been rough turnned,,anchorsealed on the end grain set aside for the anchorseal to dry and then bagged and put up for drying.
Donny

[Jim Sebring]

After rough turning, I usually coat all of the bowl except the tenon. I leave that part uncoated so I can use my moisture meter to check how dry the wood is. I just let the Anchorseal dry, then stack several rough-turned bowls in the open in the shop. BTW, I have some Oregon Ash (we call it mountain ash around here) from a tree cut 1 1/2 years ago that has not checked/cracked at all. It's the only wood I have locally available that doesn't crack!

[Mark Levitski]

Mahoney's right, you'd better not be in a hurry. Anchorseal works so well that if you coat the entire bowl it will take a very long time to dry, which definitely will help prevent checking. I recently finish-turned a crab apple bowl that sat for a year on the shelf (shop at 40%RH) coated with AS after roughing out, and it was still wet and green inside. If you can do production runs of A LOT of roughed bowls to sit them on the shelf indefinitely, then coat the whole thing and dispense w/ paper bags. Otherwise I'd say to use some AS on the knots, figure, endgrain and then use a bag. Bags work well for us. Watch the CA glue; it will penetrate far enough to leave obvious stains on the finished work. Search some other threads on this for advice. I plan to experiment with a sealer coat of shellac on the entire rough-out. That might slow down drying as well as allow the use of CA if needed (stops the glue from that penetration). Probably cheaper than AS?

The most frustrating thing in this work is dealing with wood movement and the losses from checking and cracking. Hard to see some of those special pieces get used for firewood, because sometimes no matter what one does, losses occur.

[Wyatt Holm]

I coat the whole thing, and let it dry for six months or more. I do not use paper bags.