Thorny Honey Locust Bowl

[Tom Hartranft]

An ~8" dia branch came down last spring from my Honey Locust tree back by my woods property line. I got out the chain saw and cut the fallen branch into mostly firewood for seasoning but split a couple of the largest log billets into candidate bowl turning pieces and let dry some in my garage for the past 8 months. I prepped one of the half log billets today and turned it ... tough stuff, but I really like the colorful grain pattern. Thought I'd share some pics.


Tom
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A Honey Locust tree has many large thorns. Leaves are typical of locust trees in general ... small and oval shaped. Here are two photos of a Honey Locust tree that I downloaded from online ... my tree is just like what is shown in the photos. Nasty looking thorns.

http://i482.photobucket.com/albums/rr183/tjh_020/121216%20Honey%20Locust/PICT5198a_zps9fc4c95b.jpg

http://i482.photobucket.com/albums/rr183/tjh_020/121216%20Honey%20Locust/PICT5202a_zpsb3d6e549.jpg

Here are two photos of the finished 6" dia x 3" deep bowl. The first pic has the bowl sitting beside a half-log billet from the same tree showing the wide yellowish sapwood in contrast to the reddish-brown heartwood. One of the ~3" long thorns is still attached to a tough stem on the side of the half-log billet. The wood is dense, very heavy, very hard, and strong in bending. I bandsawed to rough round shape. Rough-turning the outside of the bowl to completely round was a challenge -- very tough and hard wood. The bowl sides are fairly thick to emphasize the toughness of the overall wood. The bowl is quite heavy weight wise for its small size. I finished the bowl with paste wax and couple of spinning coats of BLO.

http://i482.photobucket.com/albums/rr183/tjh_020/121216%20Honey%20Locust/IMG_1935Small_zps089165f5.jpg

http://i482.photobucket.com/albums/rr183/tjh_020/121216%20Honey%20Locust/IMG_1931Small_zps03d290ee.jpg

[Clarence Martin]

Does Locust stink like Walnut does ? I had a Locust tree in the backyard that I finally was able to get rid of after many tries.

[Mike Cruz]

Stink, did you say stink? Walnut? Stink?!?!?!?!?! MMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, walnut has a pleasantly sweet aroma........ It doesn't "stink"! :D Sorry, you poo-pooed on my favorite wood...:o To answer your question, though...no, it doesn't.

Tom, those thorns are sharp, aren't they?! And they grow back like crazy, too. Great defense mechanism for a tree...

I like the contrasting colors in that bowl. Did you turn and finish that green?

[Clarence Martin]

How old do you estimate that tree was ?

[charlie knighton]

i like your bowl.....can you use the thorns in a project some time.....might put some on a shelf and see what comes about down the road

[Baxter Smith]

That is some pretty wood with some not so pretty thorns!

[Bernie Weishapl]

Really a good looking bowl. We have a lot of that thorny locust around here. The neighbor boy ran one of those thorns clear thru his foot.

[robert baccus]

Pretty bowl--HL was a valuable tree when modern furniture was hot. It ia a legume like cocobo--hard, rot resistant strong and contrasting heart. Measured thorns on some in the atchaflay?? swamp with 17" thorns. made several 17X3" platters years ago--really good cutting.

[Jamie Donaldson]

I have some monster HL thorns here in KY and have used them in several ways in my turnings over the years. Here is one in a series I title "Flowers with Attitude."

[robert baccus]

Nice piece--best use for those things. I ruined several sets of waders wandering through the bottoms in the dark. Ouch!! Great turning wood>

[Leo Van Der Loo]

I like turning Honey locust and the looks of the color variation between early and late wood in the grain of the wood, and I'm very happy that hardly any Honey Locust that grows in Ontario has the big long thorns, I've seen some trees with them, but most are planted by town and city park dept. and those are all clones without the thorns, sure makes handling the pieces/logs a lot easier.

Nice bowl Tom, I also noticed that you did saw the log across rather than length-wise, cutting the wood length-wise would make that cut much easier and faster, just hold the saw a bit on a angle so your saw won't get plugged with the long strings of wood :)

[Tom Hartranft]

Here are responses to posted questions or comments:

"Does the wood stink?" ... No ... has a good wood smell.

"Did you turn and finish that green?" ... Turned it 8 months after cutting the branch off of the tree.

"Looks like you sawed the log cross-wise ... would have been easier to cut it lengthwise." .... Actually, I did cut the branch log billets in half lengthwise in a ripping cut. Perhaps I've misunderstood the comment??

"How old is the tree that the branch came from ?" ... Don't know; the base of the tree is ~15" dia. Here's a photo of the broken branch the day after a windstorm brought it down last spring. The fracture area was riddled with ant holes so that's why it didn't hold up to the wind. Because of the long fracture and ant-riddled area, I only got ~4' of usable log billets out of the largest section of broken branch.

http://i482.photobucket.com/albums/rr183/tjh_020/121216%20Honey%20Locust/IMG_1570Small_zps7f4d3c30.jpg

[Leo Van Der Loo]

/snip//snip/

"Looks like you sawed the log cross-wise ... would have been easier to cut it lengthwise." .... Actually, I did cut the branch log billets in half lengthwise in a ripping cut. Perhaps I've misunderstood the comment??



Tom it appears that you cut the log this way (see arrows)

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and I meant that if you cut it in the directions of the arrows as shown below, it would be cut much more easily :)

248339

[Mike Cruz]

I have to agree with Leo...cutting like the second pic is a LOT easier on you! Though it does create a lot of long stringy shavings that clog the chainsaw. But still, at least you aren't getting beaten up by a bouncing chainsaw.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Mike if you hold your saw on a slight angle the strings do not get as long as if you hold the saw in the exact level way as the log itself, the wood strings usually break up on the year ring changes, anyway that is how I do my sawing of wet wood pieces and it works for me :D

[Mike Cruz]

Good to know, Leo, thanks! I'll try that...

[Tom Hartranft]

Leo ... thanks for the added illustrations of your chainsawing advice. You've got a good eye observing the rip sawing pattern in my photo and noting the reason for same. Now I understand ... will change my chainsaw cutting approach on the next tree that falls in my back yard ... will need to make a temporary cradle to safely hold the log billets steady for lengthwise ripping.

Tom

[Mike Cruz]

Tom, an easy cradle is a sacrafice log with a "V" cut out lengthwise for the log you want to cut to sit in the "V". But you have to chock the sacrafice log so it doesn't roll side to side.

Also, with this method, you'll want to make your center cut(s) to cut out the pith first...but don't cut all the way through! Stop a couple inches from the end of the cut. Then make your outside cuts (assuming you not doing a NE bowl) and cut them all the way through. Then go back and finish that last couple inches in the middle cut(s). If you don't do it that way, you are left with a 1/2 log that won't want to stand up for those outside cuts... Hope that was explained well enough.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Tom if you want to build a safe saw horse that will last, then I have a PDF here that shows how to.

It uses 1" dowel pegs for holding the 2 top plates, so there are no steel bolts or screws to saw into.

Mind you when not at home, I have used a block set on end to lay the one to be sawn on, a couple of wedge pieces will keep it on top.

http://www.ovwg.org/New-OVWG-Site/Techniques/Saw%20horse.pdf

Also a few pictures that are worth looking at, it will show at least one way of doing this

http://wonderfulwood.com/sawing-a-log-for-bowls/