Stabilize wood for turning

[Matt Mackinnon]

I have a huge box of some really nice off cuts of burls and spalted wood. The down side is that most of it is too fragile for myself with my skills to turn. I seem to be able to find that catch and blow it out.

I was talking to several turners who suggested that I stabilize the wood first. So I went out and got one of those 2.5gal pressure paint cans from my local Princess Auto (Harbour Freight). I own an air compressor as well as a vacuum pump (for my OneWay lathe) so I guess I can use the pot either way.

I can easily get the Alumilite resin locally and use it under pressure.. but don't have any experience on how well that will work with pushing the resin into a lightweight (kiln dry) burl.

I have read about Catus Juice, but it's not so readily available here in Canada and obscenely expensive to ship it until you get into large containers that cost hundreds of dollars. ouch.

Are there any other options that I should be looking into?
Should I look to make this pot into a vacuum or pressure pot?

any help or suggestions is much appreciated.

Matt

[Shawn Pachlhofer]

have you tried contacting Curtis at Turn Tex directly to ask him about shipping to Canada?

www.turntex.com is his website.

you'll need to convert your pressure pot to a vacuum chamber to use Cactus Juice. Since it does not have a clear lid to watch, you'll also need to rig up some sort of a liquid trap between the chamber and the vacuum pump.

[robert baccus]

Pressure and resins don't work well on big pieces. Cheap and easy---Obtain some clear fiberglass 0r epoxy resin--mix an appropriate amount?? thin with acetone until it just runs off a stiring stick. Using a VINYL black yard bag do a shake and bake after adding your roughed out wood and thinned resin. Shake every hour or so and it will be hard in the morning.. When turning if you hit some soft wood down deep simply repeat. It does not discolor the wood or change the texture--a big +.

[Grant Wilkinson]

Matt: Alumilite will not work for your application. You may want to give Pentacryl a try. You can get small bottles at LV. I've used it on a couple of green blanks and it did the job very well. I simply soaked the pieces. I'm sure that a vacuum chamber would have improved the results.

[Dan Masshardt]

You might be able to find another turner there in Canada who could stabilize some for you.

What size of pieces? What kind of items are you trying to turn with this wood?

[Olaf Vogel]

I love turning such crazy and rotted pieces, so have tried out a few different stabilizers.

Pentacryl - personally I've had no luck.
- Didn't harden the wood.
- Left a waxy finish that would not accept any other finish.
- Took a lot of product/cost and time. I found it to be basically a waste of effort. Very possible I did something wrong, but there are many similar reviews online.
- Can't recommend it

MinWax Wood Hardener - works very well.
- Soaks in at least 1". I generally cut mostly to shape then pour this on - so I don't soak the whole thing.
- Dries very quickly - multiple coats can be applied in a few min.
- Hard as rock after 24 hrs. Cuts well.
- Stinks like hell - only do this outside with a filter mask. No idea what the volatile components are, but don't want to be exposed to them...probably very flammable. Its like working with acetone, evaporates instantly.
BTW - spraying this is likely not a good idea. I literally POUR this onto the very soft spots and it dries as I watch.

- Expensive if you are doing large pieces. Only comes in pint sized bottles.
- Not available in all HD/Lowes etc, but not that hard to find.
- personally I really like it. No...I haven't been sniffing it... :)

CPES - Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer - http://www.rotdoctor.com/products/cpes.html
Haven't tried it, sounds promising. Not sure if the benefits are all marketing or its really "better" than the competitors.

Olaf

[Michael Armstrong]

Matt:
Don't know where in Canada you are but if you are in Ontario and better yet close to Owen Sound we might be able to work something out. How large and how much wood are you needing stabilized and how big are the pieces?

Michael

[robert baccus]

If you are uncomfortable with homemade brews, there is a marine product called "Git Rot" that has been used for 50 years. My recipe is simply a cheap knockoff and has fixed many soft bowls and boats. An old boat yard mixture.

[Matt Mackinnon]

up until now I have been just using the lighter than water CA for the cracks in the burls. Then I have been useing the thick CA to fill in the gaps in the burls. then I eventually get around to turning them. I am not doing bowels or really anything complicated. Mostly small things like pens, bottle stops, and christmas tree ornaments. Nothing like having the largest OneWay lathe to turn items that are smaller than your fist.

Ultimately, I think that I need have/use both a vacuume chamber to stabilize, and the pressure pot to cast. When taking an endcut of some burl, you get very large voids with splintered gaps that are natural to that part of the wood. What will be needed is to fill all that area with Alumilite so you get a solid chunk to turn and make items like wine bottle tops, and the roofs for birdhouse christmas ornaments. Yet, I also when making pens like to use full pieces of burl that have micro fissures and fractures in the wood. I have had times when they simply blow-up when turning.

The down side to my single pressure pot / vacuum chamber from this Paint Pot solution is that it works very well for pressure but for vacuum you can't see what is going on inside. I am wondering. From the video's that I have seen from TurnTex using cacusjuice, it looks to bubble (boil) when the air inside the wood comes out under the vacuum. Now inside the metal pot, if I put a larger container like a tall plastic potato salad tub that you get at Walmart with some holes poked in the lid, and put the wood and cactus juice inside of that, then the tub would minimize the splash out of the juice but still allow air to be removed to make a vacuum. Would that not work? Just trying to think outside of the box.

Matt

[Grant Wilkinson]

Your potato salad tub idea will work fine. You don't need a lid on it at all. Just make sure that it is tall enough to contain the "froth" or you will have a mess to clean up. Also make sure that you have enough stabilizer to fully fill the voids, or you will end up sucking air when you release the vacuum.

[Dan Masshardt]

I have a friend who uses a pickle jar to stabilize. There are many possibilities - some safer than others.

I have a pressure pot for casting and a clear vacuum chamber for stabilizing.

Like most other things in the shop, the 'right' tool is best. But other things can work, especially for occasional use.

[Matt Mackinnon]

I was thinking of the pickle jar for giving it a test/try. To go out and spend hundreds on a vacuum chamber seems rather pre-mature if you can give it a test with a much lower cost alternative. if it works well and I can see a return for the outlay then I'd consider buying the right tool.

thanks for all the suggestions and feedback.

[Matt Mackinnon]

I got my pressure pot. it says it is rated to 80psi on the box, and an operating pressure (for painting) between 25-50psi. I gather from reading about Alumilite that you put it under pressure to reduce the size of the bubbles basically to microscopic and the higher the pressure, the smaller the bubble. Would going up to 60psi be better than running at 50? at what point is the diminishing return vs. safety?

I have also made myself a vacuum pot out of a 2 quart mason jar from my M.I.L. I am waiting on getting some of the Hold Fast resin as I can buy that locally, rather than trying to order through Curtis, though I probably will end up buying through him once I have a few pieces under my belt and buy a factory pressure chamber and start doing bulk.

I am interested in casting some buckeye burls along with maple and others that I have found. I know that the buckeye is very light so I am to gather there is lots of air pockets inside the burl. I can understand that stabilizing the wood first before casting with Alumilite would be the preference. is this something that I should do to all my wood/alumilite castings, or just for the porous ones? I would think that a denser wood will just not take in much of the stabilizing resin but is there another chemical side to this? ie it helps the alumilite to bond?

Just looking to pull on the knowledge here before trying it myself.

thanks

[Dale Gillaspy]

I would steer away from pickle jars for vacuum stabilizing. I have seen them implode, and it is not fun. You can make your own for about $12. Get a large stainless steel tin from a restaurant supply house. Use thick plexi for the top and screw the gauge and valve into that. Use rubber as a sealer between the two....done. Works great.

[Matt Mackinnon]

I have a few very good stainless steel buckets from LeeValley but the hardest part is finding the correct size rubber gasket to fit around it. I think that I am basically stuck buying a factory chamber then.

From what I have seen on the internet, the glass chamber failures seem to come from people who want to make some plasma light show and are putting electrodes and a voltage through the vacuum and the heat of this arc causes the glass to fail.

What I am left to wonder is how much vacuum pressure is needed to pull air out of wood? Do you need to get down to 25" of mercury, or would a lighter vacuum work, be it more slowly?

[Shawn Pachlhofer]

you need as much vacuum as you can get

and there have been failures of glass containers (jars) used for pulling vacuum for stabilizing

if you can find it, you can use glass laboratory vacuum containers. I've seen the pots used - and I've also seen them dent due to vacuum as well.

[Dale Gillaspy]

You don't have to have an exact size gasket. A piece of butyl rubber cut in a donut shape will work just great. So will the hobby store foam for kids scrap book projects, if you can find it big enough. Excess on the sides is fine, as long as it makes the seal.

A lesser vacuum may work, but will take a long time. My experience is you really need about 25 bars, but experiment. It may work great for you. The biggest thing is to watch your bleeder valve. As you start the vacuum, you will need to bleed off the air it is pulling so foam doesn't back up into the hose and get into your pump. You will end up having to rebuild your pump. Bleed it a little at a time until all the foam stabilizes, then let it pull vacuum until the bubbles stop. My experience has been about 30 minutes for pen blanks, but yours may vary.

[david privett]

I am just asking here but could what you are trying to do be done with a air conditioner vacuum evacuation system pump and a pressure canning pot? where the weight rattles on the lid use that as a vacuum port.

[Shawn Pachlhofer]

yes - you can use an AC vacuum pump provided you can adapt the hose/fittings to the chamber

I don't know about using a pressure cooker. It could be done - but one of the benefits of having a clear chamber or lid is that you can see when the wood stops bubbling. You won't de able to do that using a pressure cooker.

also - if you do use a pressure cooker - make sure you include a solvent trap between the chamber and the pump. Vacuum pumps do not handle sucking up fluid very well.

[Matt Mackinnon]

It is very easy to be a neigh sayer when it comes to a pickle jar vacuum chamber, but I am wondering if this is based on a set of FACTS or just gut feeling because it sounds good? I would like to know if anyone has actually had a pickle jar (thick walled mason jar) actually implode on them? I have seen the video's where people take a 55gal steel drum and fill it with a bit of water, heat it and then shock cool it down and have it implode. But other than creating a vacuum, the similarities stop there.

In the case of a pickle jar for stabilizing, you need to base it on a few facts.

1. a full vacuum is about 30psi pressure. And good luck getting a full vacuum so the force on your jar is less than that.
2. a vacuum is the absence of matter in a space. The jar will probably be filled 70% full with wood, stabilizer etc. So your 1 quart mason jar will have about 8oz area of air that is being evacuated. So in the case of an implosion, it is that amount of air that needs to be replace from the surrounding atmosphere. (ie not a whole lot)
3. Your bigger concern with an implosion is the splash out of the liquid stabilizer going everywhere and taking the glass with it. Safety tip. Put it in a 10" square metal tin. That will contain any splash out so it doesn't go everywhere.
4. If you are still concerned with glass, then wrap the bottle with a few thin strips of duct tape. You will still see the bubbles between the strips and the glass will be mostly secured by the tape. I don't know if you have ever moved a mirror, but it is common practice to run a few strips of tape over the surface so that if it broke the glass would not scatter everywhere.


Now if you wanted to make your own non glass DIY vacuum chamber, you can use Schedule 40 clear PVC pipe. The down side is that it comes in 5' lengths and you probably only need 10-12" of it. So unless you know of 4-5 other people who also want to make a DIY chamber, then you are paying for un-used pipe. so really it comes down to you are not saving all that much money to make your own over buying one.

[Shawn Pachlhofer]

So you have no stabilizing experience at all - yet you are giving advice on how to do it?

consider this: http://www.penturners.org/forum/f43/glass-chamber-**-caution**-114771/

[Matt Mackinnon]

So you have no stabilizing experience at all - yet you are giving advice on how to do it?

consider this: http://www.penturners.org/forum/f43/glass-chamber-**-caution**-114771/

I am not giving advice, but looking for substantiated help that is backed up by something. Thankyou for giving me a link to an actual failure. What I would be curious to know however the shape of the glass vase, but more important that the purchaser probably would not know what what sort of glass that the vase was made of. I have worked with glass in the past through my local college doing blowing, slumping and jewellery work. I know that some types of glass are very decretive but are in no means very structural. Also, not knowing if the vase at hand was even properly annealed but given that it was a VASE and in no way connected to the higher standards that the FDA give for glass to be used in food preparation. Like I would not expect a pirex measuring cup to simply explode if you put hot water into it from thermal shock, but a flower vase more than likely would.

An actual Mason jar is designed to be put into a hot water bath and have a lid put onto it and be under vacuum to hold the contents inside fresh for a period of time. I don't know if that would make any difference to the life expectancy of using it under substantially more vacuum.. I don't know the exact pressure that you can get with canning? This is in no way saying that it is safe to use. I am just trying to get a better understanding of the risks involved.

[Matt Mackinnon]

With all due humility and apologies to anyone who I may have offended, I sincerely apologize. I have spent some time doing more research and have a better understanding now of what is required for stabilization and the limitations there within. Please close this thread.

[Jery Madigan]

It is very easy to be a neigh sayer when it comes to a pickle jar vacuum chamber, but I am wondering if this is based on a set of FACTS or just gut feeling because it sounds good? I would like to know if anyone has actually had a pickle jar (thick walled mason jar) actually implode on them? I have seen the video's where people take a 55gal steel drum and fill it with a bit of water, heat it and then shock cool it down and have it implode. But other than creating a vacuum, the similarities stop there.

In the case of a pickle jar for stabilizing, you need to base it on a few facts.

1. a full vacuum is about 30psi pressure. And good luck getting a full vacuum so the force on your jar is less than that.
2. a vacuum is the absence of matter in a space. The jar will probably be filled 70% full with wood, stabilizer etc. So your 1 quart mason jar will have about 8oz area of air that is being evacuated. So in the case of an implosion, it is that amount of air that needs to be replace from the surrounding atmosphere. (ie not a whole lot)
3. Your bigger concern with an implosion is the splash out of the liquid stabilizer going everywhere and taking the glass with it. Safety tip. Put it in a 10" square metal tin. That will contain any splash out so it doesn't go everywhere.
4. If you are still concerned with glass, then wrap the bottle with a few thin strips of duct tape. You will still see the bubbles between the strips and the glass will be mostly secured by the tape. I don't know if you have ever moved a mirror, but it is common practice to run a few strips of tape over the surface so that if it broke the glass would not scatter everywhere.


Now if you wanted to make your own non glass DIY vacuum chamber, you can use Schedule 40 clear PVC pipe. The down side is that it comes in 5' lengths and you probably only need 10-12" of it. So unless you know of 4-5 other people who also want to make a DIY chamber, then you are paying for un-used pipe. so really it comes down to you are not saving all that much money to make your own over buying one.

Schedule 40 clear PVC can be had in 1' and 2' lengths on the auction site. Easy to make a chamber with it.

[Dean S Walker]

have you tried contacting Curtis at Turn Tex directly to ask him about shipping to Canada?

www.turntex.com (http://www.turntex.com) is his website.

you'll need to convert your pressure pot to a vacuum chamber to use Cactus Juice. Since it does not have a clear lid to watch, you'll also need to rig up some sort of a liquid trap between the chamber and the vacuum pump.


I second this, Curtis is a good guy, just give him a call.