How Is Butternut Wood For Turning?

[Daner Steel]

Daner, sweet haul! I wish I was there - love butternut!

Hi John here's some of that butternut finished.....It dried preaty fast

[John Keeton]

Nice, Daner - very nice!! Amazing coincidence, though - I just received a nice, large chunk of butternut from fellow creeker, Jerry Rhoads! I will take care of the thank you in other ways, but thanks, Jerry!!

[Russell Eaton]

The grain in that piece is great. How big of a bowl is that? Hard to tell from the picture.

[Daner Steel]

The grain in that piece is great. How big of a bowl is that? Hard to tell from the picture.

It's 19"......I'm going to ware It when I cut the grass this summer....I think it will keep the sun outa my eyes

[Jerry Rhoads]

Great looking supply of Butternut Danner. Could make 100's of things with that.

[Dan Gaylin]

Reviving an old thread here, as I had a chance to turn some kiln dried butternut over the weekend. It turned out pretty nice, but I found it an unusual wood to work with -- it is very light, and somewhat soft. It's finicky. End-grain took real care and I found that everything just needed a light touch to get good results. Also, it didn't want to be sanded with the lathe in reverse created slight un-eveness and fuzzies. That was new to me.

When I looked at this thread prior to doing the turning, I was surprised to see the wood called "white walnut" because it doesn't seem to have any of the properties of walnut (which I love to turn), which is much denser, harder, and IMO easier to turn. BUT, then I sanded the piece and put some finish on it, and I laughed because it LOOKS exactly like a lighter version of walnut. Anyway, very interesting and fun all in all.

IMG-0375.jpgIMG-0376.jpg

[Matt Hutchinson]

It looks very nice. Good work!

[Keith Outten]

A couple pics of the Butternut I recently received from Forest2Home. I have never worked with Butternut and I am looking forward to doing some intarsia projects to start with and turn some pens for friends and family.