How to dry Walnut crotch?

[Rob Will]

I just sawed a large Walnut tree with lots of feathered crotch grain patterns. With your advice, I was able to cut it for maximum grain reveal.
Most of the slabs are 5/4.

Now that the log is cut, the ends are sealed, and the slabs are stacked, any special considerations to drying these "curly" slabs?

They are stacked in a barn with some air movement but no direct sun or wind.

A special thanks to Alan Turner who took time to show me a few things about walnut crotch veneers when I visited PFW last year.

Rob

[Gary Breckenridge]

:cool: Have you stickered the planks with sticks about 1 foot apart? Is the floor or base level? Is the wood low in the barn where there are no temp extremes? Have you weighted the top boards so they don't bend upward? If yes on all these you only have to wait a year and a half and then bring them into your shop to acclimate for a week. Then you should be ready to go.:cool:

[Rick Christopherson]

If these crotch planks have a lot of wild grain with capillaries exiting the wood in random places, you will want to do whatever you can to slow down the initial drying. The wild grain exiting the surface of a plank is no different than the end grain, and that is why it is sealed. You'll have to take this on a case by case basis, but because most crotch wood has visible end grain in the crotch, you may want to apply a thin coat of sealant at the crotch to keep it from drying faster than the adjacent wood.

[Rob Will]

If these crotch planks have a lot of wild grain with capillaries exiting the wood in random places, you will want to do whatever you can to slow down the initial drying. The wild grain exiting the surface of a plank is no different than the end grain, and that is why it is sealed. You'll have to take this on a case by case basis, but because most crotch wood has visible end grain in the crotch, you may want to apply a thin coat of sealant at the crotch to keep it from drying faster than the adjacent wood.

On a few thick slabs, I have experimented with applying sealant to the entire piece. If I don't care how long it takes to dry, is there anything wrong with sealing all surfaces of an especially high figured plank?

Will some moisture still be able to pass through a product like Anchor Seal or Bailey's Log Sealer?

Rob

[Rick Christopherson]

Rob,
Those sealers are very good at sealing out moisture. Possibly too good for coating the whole surface. I had one large/thick slab where I applied sealer several inches in from the end to cover some wild grain. Within a few months it was obvious that the center of the slab had shrunk, but the end was still noticeably larger from not drying.

No, there is nothing wrong with sealing the whole surface. A thin coat may be enough to slow drying down without stopping it. Then when you have areas where you can see the grain exiting the wood, you could put it on a little thicker. This would make the drying more even. After the moisture level has dropped to a reasonable level, then you can scrape or plane the sealer off to speed up the last bit of drying. The risk is when the log is very wet, not when it is nearly dry.