Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[yoyospin]

Here are some new ones for your viewing pleasure...

Turquoise & Box Elder Burl:




Box Elder Burl, African Blackwood and acrylics:




Osage Orange with dark green honeycomb composite:




Brazilian Kingwood and Bloody Basin Jasper Stone:

[Jeremy McCreary]

Gorgeous as usual, Ed! Especially like the one with the black and red rim.

How long does it take you to crank one of these out once you have all the tools and materials?

[yoyospin]

Gorgeous as usual, Ed! Especially like the one with the black and red rim.

How long does it take you to crank one of these out once you have all the tools and materials?

Thanks Jeremy. Regarding time to make, it depends totally on the number of materials used. For a simple single-wood top, maybe 20 to 45 minutes. On the other end of the scale, getting a piece of wood or plastic perfectly flat so it can be laminated to another piece is the biggest challenge. This one took about three hours, with eight elements making up the piece:

[Iacopo]

I too like the last one, but also the first one with the turquoise.
I see you have used root wood for the stem of the first top: haven't you problems of warping, doing so ?
The aesthetics anyway is fantastic.

[yoyospin]

I too like the last one, but also the first one with the turquoise.
I see you have used root wood for the stem of the first top: haven't you problems of warping, doing so ?
The aesthetics anyway is fantastic.

Thanks,

Root wood and burl wood (what I use), are really two completely different things. Burl-caps are technically a cancer usually found on the side of certain species of trees. Box Elder Burl (used on the 1st top, above) is a very punky, soft wood, and not very useful for turning. There is a way to fix this problem, by using a high pressure vacuum resin injection process called stabilization, plasticizing the wood. When a really soft wood is stabilized, its weight is often more than doubled through the addition of resin, making the wood much stronger, and turn-able...so you get the benefit of these beautiful burl eyes and veins, but none of the downside of a weak/soft wood.

BTW, "stabilizing" wood is a very time consuming and expensive process, and is used primarily by high-end custom knife makers. A typical piece of stabilized Box Elder, measuring 1" x 2" x 5" (intended for knife handle scales) will cost between $25 and $40.

Here's what a burl-cap looks like:

[Iacopo]

Thank you, Yoyospin, a very informative answer.

[Jeremy McCreary]

When a really soft wood is stabilized, its weight is often more than doubled through the addition of resin, making the wood much stronger, and turn-able...so you get the benefit of these beautiful burl eyes and veins, but none of the downside of a weak/soft wood.

Some very interesting materials science there, Ed. Better living through plastic, I always say!

[yoyospin]

Jeremy, that's funny. I like to say...Wood is Good, but Plastic is Fantastic. If you'd like to see how the hobbyist-level wood stabilization process works, here's a pretty good video on the subject:

https://youtu.be/WGEQstQKLFs

[the Earl of Whirl]

Very nice.  I like the information about plasticizing the wood.

[Jeremy McCreary]

Hmmm, does that stuff also work on people who are full of hot air? I have this brother-in-law...