Cherry platter rough out

[Greg Bolton22]

I got an offer to get some "scraps" i.e. crotches and stump pieces from a friend that is milling the cherry trees that he lost during Irene. I grabbed a few pieces on Saturday, brought them home and processed them into blanks. I have a lot of other wood that I really should have worked with on Sunday but couldn't resist this half of a large crotch. I decided to try my hand at a platter for the first time. I didn't take the time to research wall thickness and such so I just guessed at it. It is now bagged and tagged so we will see if it survives the drying process.

222999222997222998

Now that it is too late, please advise me on theory behind turning green platters. Sorry for the cell phone pics, gotta get better about using a camera.

Thanks,

Greg

[Steve Busey]

You might be in pretty good shape with the drying, Greg. Irene was quite a few months ago, so the wood ought to be pretty dry. As you turned off a layer, did it feel cool and wet, or hot from the cutting action? Either way, nice looking piece of cherry - looking forward to the final result!

[Thomas Canfield]

That is an interesting piede of wood. You did not give diameter and thickness, but I would be expecting some major warpage because of the crotch and large section of sap on the edge. The center looks to also be thicker than the outer which make for more force on the outer when drying. I also see that you are using a recess and it makes me wonder how you plan to mount the dried piece after it has warped. I have had better luck using a tenon that allows me to true up the warped tenon between centers and even start truing up some of the outer areas. Let us know how it "turns" out.

[John Keeton]

Tom, in the third pic, it appears Greg is using a tenon with some excess diameter, so on that point he should be OK. Sure is some awesome wood - I hope it survives as the result will be well worth the wait!

[Greg Bolton22]

Thanks for the responses!

Steve- Some of the roots were still in the ground so there was still some moisture in the sap wood but it was not slinging water like some freshly cut trees if have turned.

Thomas- The diameter is probably 14" and wall thickness is around an inch. I know about the 10% rule but it just looked too bulky to leave the platter that thick. It is hard to tell from the bad picture but the center is dished out to give even wall thickness through the sides and bottom. As john stated, I am using a tenon not a recess.

John- Thanks, I hope it does as well!

I still have the other half of this crotch so I am still interested in opinions on turning green platters.

Thanks again,

Greg

[Pat Scott]

I used to rough out platters similar to what you did, but I don't do it that way anymore. One reason is that it pre-defines the shape, and depending on how it dries the shape may or may not still work. The 2nd reason is you never know how it will dry. It's good that you have even thickness throughout, but 1" thickness may not be enough depending on how it dries. I've had some platters that I rough out like you did, and when it dries it looks like a potato chip it has curled so bad. When you go to true the blank back up, 1" thickness may not give you enough room to true it up and have the final platter thickness you want.

What I do now when roughing out plates and platters is just put the blank between centers and true up both sides and the edge and call it good. Picture a circle being cut out of a 8/4 piece of lumber and that's what my blanks look like. I've had a much higher success rate of ending up with what I want doing it this way. And if I end up with a thicker blank than I need, I think that's better than too thin!

[David E Keller]

Neat piece of wood! I turned a platter out of a spalted hackberry crotch which I thought was dry... It twisted and turned into an unusable form. Since then, I've done exactly what Pat suggested... I seal the outside rim of the blank with anchor seal that wraps around about an inch onto each face of the blank. I've got a couple of cherry pieces that have been drying this way for 6 months with no checking or cracking, and the other side of the hackberry crotch is surviving after being done in the same fashion.

[Thomas Canfield]

Tenon it is. I am going in for an eye exam next month, but that might not help looking at this laptop. I recently tried DNA on a River Birch platter a little smaller than that (12") and was surprised how much warpage resulted and it was cut from slab well away from pith.

[Pat Scott]

Tom the reason it warped so much is probably because it was cut well away from the pith. The most stable plate and platter stock is in the middle on either side of the pith, where the growth rings are as close to 90 degrees (quarter sawn) to the surface as you can get. Actually the best stock is start in the middle of the tree (near the pith) and go out. But for this to work, that means Greg's 14" platter has to come from a tree at least 28"+ in diameter once you account for cutting and truing up. If you cut the platter blank just to either side of the pith, then you can get away with a 14"+ diameter tree.

[Greg Bolton22]

Thanks for all of the suggestions.

Pat- do you put a tenon on your roughouts or just leave it as a 8/4 disk? How long do you let it dry before returning it? A 14"X2" disk seems like it would take a long time to dry, are you DNA soaking? Sorry for all of the questions but I am new to the whole platter concept but am really looking forward to getting some completed.

Thanks,

Greg

[Reed Gray]

If I am cutting slabs like that for platter turning, I make sure that the center of the tree is at the bottom of the bowl, rather than normal bowl orientation where the outside is the rounded bottom of the bowl. Reason is that when it dries and warps, if the center of the tree is at the bottom, the bottom will warp down, and the edges of the bowl will warp up. The other way around, the center of the bowl rises up, and not much will sit in it. Found out the hard way.

robo hippy

[Pat Scott]

No, I don't put a tenon on my platter rough outs, I just leave them as a 8/4 disk. You might be able to get by with a 6/4 or 7/4 rough out, but then depending on how much it curls while drying, when you go to true it up again you might not have enough thickness left to make the shape and depth that you want. No tenon also means I'm still free to change my mind about which side I want to be the top or bottom. When the blank is dry, I put the piece back between centers, true up both faces, then I can pick which side is the bottom and cut my tenon then.

Where I live an 8/4 disk can take 1-2 years to dry depending on species (a good rule of thumb is 1 year drying time for every inch of thickness). I coat the whole thing in Anchorseal, and sometimes for my crotch platters I also put them in a paper bag in addition to Anchorseal. I leave them in the paper bag for several months (3-6), then take them out and let them dry the remaining time in the open air. I don't know if it's me or just my perception, but sometimes it seems my crotch platters will split more readily than plain blanks. I put them in a bag to slow down moisture loss even more than Anchorseal alone. After a couple of months enough moisture is gone that I can take them out of the bag. If they haven't split by now, they won't. I have a moisture meter to check drying progress, but I have anywhere from 2-4 dozen or more platter blanks drying at any one time (in addition to my hundreds of bowl blanks), so by the time I get around to them they are usually dry. Be sure to write the date on your rough outs.

[Greg Bolton22]

Thanks Pat.

Looks like I need to start putting up some platter blanks and then go back to bowls and pens for a year or two while they dry.

Greg

[Bernie Weishapl]

Greg that is a great looking platter. Can't add much to what has already been said but that should be a beauty when finished.

[Rob Price]

Do any of you guys turn platters out of kiln dried stock? I've got two very large cutoffs I bought from my 'dealer' who just finished making a 2.5" thick walnut table. These are the drops, roughly 3'x2' and 2.5" thick. I was thinking I would try a platter or two with it. It has some very cool grain.

[Jon McElwain]

I have not turned a platter before, but I have turned a fair bit of kiln dry wood. Before I knew about the joys of green wood turning, I used to go to my local lumberyard and buy cutoffs of their 8/4 stock and turn bowls and small hollow forms. Lots of dust and harder to turn than green wood, but it was stable and I got good results. I would not hesitate to use kil dry wood for a platter - in fact, it may be more desirable than green wood!

[Pat Scott]

If you have kiln dried stock that is big enough for platters, go for it! You could cut that 3'x2' piece in half and get two large 18" platters. Or cut it down to whatever size you want. A Walnut blank that big is hard to come by. Nice score.

[Rob Price]

I'll post pics in a bit- sorry to hijack the thread. It has a lot of checking, so I'll have to be careful to get good yield. I'll start a new thread when I get to it- I'm gonna need help.

[Greg Bolton22]

Rob,

You should be good-to-go with kiln dried lumber. You can use a glue block if you want to use the entire thickness for your platter. Good luck and post some pics when finished!

Greg