Desert Domicile (a.k.a. "A Mouse's House")

[Jerry Wright]

I have always been interested in naturally occuring formsand textures. This box is the result ofa cherry base and finial, a cactus body and a red mallee burl rim and top. The red mallee burl resulted from a shortstop at Bad Dog Burls in Belchertown, MA. I left with a lot more, red and brown mallee burl caps than anticipated,but a woodworker can’t have too much wood! The cactus was inherited from my father’s stash and was given to him in the1950s by a friend who had been camping out west. The piece is 4 in. in diameter and 5 in. highto the top of the finial. Sanded to 400grit and finished with WOP. C&Cwelcome.
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[Bill Bolen]

Cool little box Jerry. All those materials sure came together well.

[Kathy Marshall]

Pretty cool little box Jerry! How was the cactus to turn? One of the guys at our club meeting this weekend had an ornament turned from a cholla skeleton. May just have to give it a try, I've got some of the cactus (live and dead) on the property.

[Jerry Wright]

Kathy - the cactus is actually very hard and turns, sands, and finishes very nicely. As a structure it is as hard or harder than cherry, just full of holes!! The center is open end to end, so you need to either put waste blocks on the ends, or glue it into the piece design.
Jerry

[John Keeton]

Very well done, Jerry!!! I love the design, and the wood combo is perfect.

[Ted Calver]

Very creative!! This is a super little box. The materials blend well together. Earthy, but elegant....nice!

[James Combs]

Cool!! A perfect example of thinking.. outside.. or is it inside.. or maybe it is just "of" the box.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Well done and a cool box.

[Harvey Ghesser]

Very nicely done, Jerry! Very creative...

[Robert McGowen]

Nice, Jerry. Like others have said, all 3 of the woods came together very nicely.

[Paulo Marin]

The cactus was inherited from my father’s stash and was given to him in the1950s by a friend who had been camping out west.

Jerry,
I was very pleased to see your turned box. I have turned PALM before which was a little soft. I was wondering how hard and abrasive is CACTUS. Based on that, how did you hold it??

I remember you had a "pasta bowl" post not long ago which was very nice, but I love the originality of this piece. The combination of the different woods and the nice touch with the burl and the finial made me want to turn a box again. A well done job.

BTW, the pictures are awesome. What kind of camera or setup did you use to take the pics?

Congrats!

Paulo :cool: Marin

[wes murphy]

very unusal box and i like it a lot. gets me thinks about what wood i have

[Baxter Smith]

Great idea! Nice design and wood combination. I was sent some cactus this spring by a fellow creeker but hadn't come up with a plan on how to use it. Now I have at least the beginnings of one! Thanks for sharing!!

[Curt Fuller]

Very cool! Is the cactus Cholla?

[Jerry Wright]

Very cool! Is the cactus Cholla?

Curt - I am not a cactus whiz. I only know of saguaro and cholla, but couldn't tell one from the other! I always thought it might be saguaro because of the diameter - around 6 inches, but ... I am traveling, but when I return home, I will take a picture of the original stock, and maybe a cactus whiz will identify it!!!

[Jerry Wright]

Jerry,
I was very pleased to see your turned box. I have turned PALM before which was a little soft. I was wondering how hard and abrasive is CACTUS. Based on that, how did you hold it??


BTW, the pictures are awesome. What kind of camera or setup did you use to take the pics?


Paulo :cool: Marin

The cactus turns easily in that it is hard and tough and does not splinter. It seems to be harder than the cherry, except since it is about 40% air, you can undercut it easily as you move from the cherry to the cactus to the red mallee. The center of the cactus is quite hollow (imagine a zucchini without the seeds) - you can see down through it, so there is no way to hold it except on the outside, but it is too irregular to do that. What I have done with this piece as well as a lamp that I made, is glue blocks onto the ends. In this case I glued up a cherry/cactus/mallee burl sandwich. I then mounted the cherry to the headstock with a screw chuck (one of those shiny black Glasers with a 3" plate) and then brought the tailstock up to hold the mallee end until I hollowed through it. I then finish turned the body on the screw chuck. The lid was also turned on the screw chuck with a very shallow hole "bite". I then turned the lid around and finished in a 3" deep jamb chuck mounted on the screw chuck. While I have a Nova chuck with a worm screw and have used it extensively on bowls, I really prefer the screw chuck because it seems that I have an easier time maintaining concentricity with the axis of the drive. It seems to make it easier to thread wood on "straighter", if you will.

Re: Photography - I am a long time nature/landscape photographer, but very recent turning photog. There are a number of very skilled folks on this site, so I can only tell you what I do, not what one should do!!! I purchased a 30" Cowboy Studio brand cloth light cube and two 5500K , 55 watt lights with small stands. I also added a Flotone #409 thunder gray gradient background - it is the secret weapon, as it provides a nice balance for the digital camera to properly record color balance. I am shooting with a Canon DSLR with a 85-320mm zoom on a tripod, using the 10sec delay shutter release to eliminat shake. The white balance must be set on daylight or 5500K for color temperature. While my camera is a pretty good one, any reasonable digital point and shoot today can do nicely, just make sure that you are using "daylight" settings for the color balance selection. Now that I have confused everyone, maybe Jamie Donaldson or John Lucas can come along and straighten it out!!!

[Jerry Marcantel]

Jerry, nice job with the Cholla. My questions, what type of glue did you use to attach the other woods, and how did you control the excess glue bubbles near the larger holes? ........ Jerry (in Tucson)

[Jerry Wright]

Jerry - I used Elmer's Carpenters Glue (yellow) only. I tend to only use a very thin skim coat of glue. If the surfaces are flat, that is all you need. Put the glue on one surface only, "trowel" off with a flat stick, then put in place and rub the surfaces together. I then clamped the sandwich.