Bradford Pear - minor gloat and a question

[Ron Chamberlin]

I scored these pieces of Bradford pear, used in our town as street shade trees, on Saturday. I hope I can get them cut up and sealed (have already done the ends) before this 92 degree heat in NE Ohio busts them up completely. Unfortunately, I do not have time right now to do more.
I can see some small bowls, some turned boxes and lots of pen blanks here!
Question is, what are the properties of this wood? Can I expect any figure? How hard or soft or brittle is it? It is very heavy right now, but it is also very green and wet. I don't have any experience with fruit woods. Granted that any free wood is good wood, was this worth saving?

[Gary Herrmann]

Definitely worth saving. In my limited turning experience, I have yet to run across a fruit wood that wasn't good to turn and didn't look good when finished. So far that includes cherry, plum and pear.

Pear is fine grained and turns very nicely. I haven't seen any figure in the pieces I harvested, but I would imagine its as possible with pear as with other trees. Mine molded a bit, but that stopped when I sprayed a little diluted bleach solution on them and got more air space around the log sections.

[Paul Zerjay]

Get all you can get. Excellent turning wood. Pretty stable. Sands to smooth as a babys butt. Not too much in the way of figure, but turns a nice umber color and takes a finish well. I stock up each spring after the storms.

[Jim Myers]

I have some drying out now that a friend cut after one of the storms and hope to turn it eventually.

I have seen some good examples of what it looks like finished on here.

[Craig Carpenter]

One of you more experienced turners should post a sticky on how to seal fresh cut wood to preserve for future use. I had a Bradford Pear split and fall last year. It's still in the back burn pile. There is about a 4' tall x about 18" across stump remaining with new growth all around the sides. I found the Creek by searching for lathes. Now after seeing all the beautiful things that you guys create, gives me the itch to at least try my hand at it. My Sister is the artist in my family, she has gone into full time oil painting for a living and has won a few awards, as well as Featured Artist for the Month of May, '07 in American Artist Magazine. One of her paintings graced the cover. I couldn't be more proud of her. She made me laugh when I converted her garage into a studio for her three years ago. She was complimentary towards me for the quality of my trim work and was more impressed that I made my own shims. HA! Anyway, for those interested, here is her website, her paintings are so clear, it looks as if a digital camera was used to make them. Enjoy! http://www.camille-engel.com/

[Christopher K. Hartley]

Ron, expect some beautiful stuff. Bradford Pear turns liker a dream and is always interesting. When turned wet it displays some deep reddish color and when dry the reddish turns more of a tan. When buffed it is absolutely gorgeous. Congrats on the haul. Try some lidded boxes.:)

[Dennis Peacock]

Get all the Bradford Pear you can get your hands on. Save the crotch piece for those "Special" projects. BP is a wonderful wood to turn and it finishes extremely well. I believe that Mark Cothren or Travis have posted a few BP turnings.

[David Epperson]

The 14' section of 30"+ diameter BP trunk that I turned into flatwood (Hey it was before I found this place :D ) has quite a bit of figure in it. I got somewhere between 200 and 250 Bd Ft out of that section of trunk. Green should work easier than seasoned, but the seasoned logs I have left don't show any extreme signs of checking even without being sealed (didn't know anything about sealing them at he time).
But the tree I got my wood from was a bit unusual in that it was 35 years old and these trees usually self destruct (by splitting down the trunk) before they get to be 20. Grows about 1" in diameter per year, so the growth rings are spaced accordingly. Which surprised me when I found that the actual wood grain was so tight and fine.

[Ron Chamberlin]

Thanks everyone for the responses, and my apologies for not running a search before I asked :o . Lots of pretty stuff posted on this forum. Hope some of mine turn out as well.