Oh my word this wood was green! Ever had this happen?

[Joshua Dinerstein]

So I was called by a friend this morning some of his neighbors were cutting down some really old Elm trees in their front yard. So I headed on over and we met up and went and filled his truck with this amazingly fresh cut Elm.

Now I am using to buying wood online and this was one of my first ever scores of free "found wood". So I decided I would rush home and start sawing some up and turn it. Well I did. And I took a shower! Holy crap! There actual surface water on it when I started turning and it continue to spray off of the piece on the lathe. My goodness. It was interesting. The shavings coming off the bowl were long and thick. Pretty cool turning something that green.

However I did have a problem and I am wondering if it was because the wood was just too darn wet to turn yet or ??? But I actually could see the wood crack as I was turning it. Ok, not actually while the lathe was on... :D But as I would stop and check for flat spots etc... I notice a crack that was forming and by the time I could "get past it" it was about 1 1/2 inches deep. But it hadn't been there when I first put the piece between centers and started. I just don't get it. I mean I could see if it had taken me hours to get to that stage but we are talking about 10 minutes or so of roughing it to vaguely round and then starting to work on the bottom. It is kind of crazy.

So I thought I would ask. Anyone else run into this kind of problem and if so what did you do to try and prevent/stop it? Was the wood really just too darn green to turn? And if that is the case how long should I let to sit before I start trying to turn any more of it?

Thanks,
Joshua


P.S. I will take a photo of the roughed bowl once it comes out fo the DNA bath. Which given the water content fo the wood should be... sometime next year. :mad:

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Hi Josh, yes I actually had something like that happen, what I found out later, is that this will happen to what they call over-mature trees, it is called spiderweb split or shake, and it actually looks like that, having ring shake and cross grain checks that altogether do look like a spiders web.
This was a oh 40"D tree or better, and it had some splits, but I cut large pieces out that did not seen to have any splits, loaded a large amound of it up and gave most of it away before I knew it was bad.
I turned some and found the hairline splits, then I started checking the other pieces and all the blocks from the bottom end of the log had these splits, so I quickly told the other turners what I ran into, and yes they did have some with the splits and only saw them after close examination.
So Josh I think the splits were there already, you just didn't see them, Elm is not a easily splitting wood a it has cross-linked fibers, I have never had the splitting happen like that in wood that didn't already have splits in it, and no wood is never too green to turn
Here's a couple of pictures of the wood I was talking about, as one of the turners did cleanup a piece to show what he found, HTH :
And one of that same wood I turned, and it shows the split in it

[Steve Schlumpf]

Joshua - I agree with Leo that the checks were most likely already there. I have had that happen on a few 4' logs that were given to me and after a little research found that the tree had been blown down in a storm and somehow was twisted in the process. Couldn't believe the internal damage that caused! I tried turning half dozen bowls but they all checked bad enough while turning that I just threw it all out. That hurt - the logs were cherry!

[Jeff Nicol]

Joshua, As Leo and Steve have said many times there are shakes or cracks in the trees. Most time they follow the growth rings of the tree though. When the cracks go against the grain it could be that the tree has been, in a word expanding back to shape after the winter with all the fresh sap and water coming up into the tree. So all this pressure is in the fresh cut wood and when you cut the tree down and into small pieces the wood expands faster with out the bark and the rest of the wood fibers to keep it from moving. Also the limbs are reactionary type wood and have different stresses on them than trunk wood so that could be part of the trouble too. Let some of the wood stay in it's full log shape and let it stablize to its new enviroment, seal the ends and wait a week or two to turn it and see what happens. I know this from doing the same thing you are expieriencing, so it can't hurt to wait a bit.

Good luck,

Jeff

[Bernie Weishapl]

I agree with the others. I have turned a lot of Elm as it is one of our most abundant trees here. I have never had a bowl or vase crack on me that didn't have ring shake or cross grain checks. Like Leo said the Elm has interlinking fibers so it doesn't crack. They will move and warp but have never had a piece crack on me yet. I have taken many a shower off Elm especially in the spring but it is never to wet to turn.

[Curt Fuller]

Joshua, I've had a good shower from green wood like you've experienced. It is kind of fun and the yard long shavings are great to watch piling up at your feet.

This is probably the worst time of year for harvesting turning wood though. The tree is pumping moisture into the wood at full throttle in preparation for the growth of new wood and leaves. So any problems associated with shrinkage and drying of the wood are at their peak in the spring. But it's also the time of year when most people are all fired up and ready to crank up their chainsaws and start renovating their yards. So there's a lot of wood available. Whenever I get fresh cut wood, especially in the spring, I just leave it in logs as long as I can handle and let them season for a year or so. Then I cut off the ends and throw that cracked end wood away but still have some good wood left over that's ready for cutting into blanks and sealing.

[Jarrod McGehee]

Ya I had the same problem with some Montery Pine I got from these people that had a 60+ y.o. tree cut down. the diameter was around 5' wide :eek: and I haven't had the time to seal it and before I knew it there were a bunch of cracks just like Leo explained. Some of the pieces were too big for my 14" chainsaw because these pieces weight somewhere in the ballpark of 225 to 275ish lbs. but I finally got some latex paint on some of it yesterday. one piece is too bad and i'll likely use it as firewood. the next piece and the one I sealed should be ok. just gotta finish the sealing process. no time :(