In the past few years I have been very lucky in that numerous friends and acquaintances have given me free wood for use in woodturning. The assortment of wood has ranged from pear, black walnut, apple, live oak logs and even some large maple burls. This blog is going to be two fold. The first portion will be concerned with my attempts to properly dry the wood. The second part will be various ideas I have come up with in an attempt to pay these people back for their generosity.

You could share some of the newly acquired wood with your woodturning friends. This has the possibility of different people seeing different ‘things’ in similar pieces of wood. By sharing your bounty with your friends hopefully these friends would share any woods they acquire with you. When you are given a whole trees worth of wood this can become a major undertaking so this is an opportune time to share.

Any time you cut a piece of wood, the moisture in the log will attempt to stabilize to your ambient humidity level. This typically causes the end checking or splits on a log. If you are going to turn the wood while it is green then you will need to turn the wood as soon as possible.

If you want to turn dry wood then you will need to do a few things to ensure your new treasure does not become just so much fire wood. The first thing I do is use a broad tipped permanent marker to write the type of wood and the date on the end of the logs. The next thing is to seal the ends of the wood with a sealant similar to End-Coat. If you use a latex paint to seal the end of the logs you will need to put the type of wood and date on the logs after the paint is dried. Once the sealant and labeling is dry then the logs will need to be stacked and covered loosely or stacked in a drying shed. The main objective is to allow the air circulating around the logs to slowly dry out the moisture contained within the logs. When drying logs it can take a few years before the wood is stabilized.

Some people rough out their turning blanks from the green wood to approximately 1 inch thickness. This method works well if you are turning bowls. Trying to turn a spindle using green wood is not feasible unless you are trying for a corkscrew appearance. There are many quick drying methods but as I have not bothered with attempting to speed up the drying process I can not recommend any of the methods. If you use a microwave oven or normal stove oven in your attempt to dry wood, make sure you do not use the appliances in your kitchen. The moisture / scent given off by the wood drying can permanently give the oven an offensive odor.

The friends that give you the wood may say they just want to get rid of the wood but by turning something using ‘their’ wood and giving a turned article to them as a gift you can be sure they will keep you in mind if they ever have any other wood to give away. You do not have to turn a museum quality piece but try to make the article show your best effort.

Two years ago I was the happy recipient of wood from a very large pear tree. I started turning miniature birdhouses this past summer and decided a bird house ornament would show my appreciation for the wood.

Another friend gave me some black walnut logs. This was paid back by turning a pen using the black walnut.

Yet another friend gave me the majority of the logs from a very old apple tree he had cut down on his property. This was paid back with a pen using his apple wood.

A friend who gave me a few live oak logs was given wooden handles for her crochet needles.