Some Shii Wood From The Local Shinto Shrine

Stuart Ablett

Member
Messages
15,917
Location
Tokyo Japan
My wife got a call from the local Shinto priestess, they had some trees trimmed on at their shrine and did I want any?

I went and looked and at first I was quite excited to see a nice sized log......

sadly_rotten_wood.jpg

The whole log was rotten, Oh well, that is why the tree had to come down I guess.

They also took some limbs off a large Shii tree (We say "Shiinoki" in Japanese which is literally "A Shii Tree") in English it is "Castanopsis (chinquapin or chinkapin)" I've never heard of it except in Japan, but it is very close to the golden chinkapins of the Pacific Northwest, if that helps, I gather it is also closely related to Beech wood.

Anyway, I got some nice pieces.
decent_shiinoki.jpg


and I cut them up in my parking space using my electric chainsaws, worked great!

shii_wood_cut1.jpg

shii_wood_cut2.jpg

shii_wood_cut3.jpg


Today I am processing them into bowl blanks, I hope to get most of them roughed out very soon as some are showing cracks!

IMG_7825.JPG


Here is the pile I've got to work through, they are on my router table, protected by some plywood, and the Phoenix bandsaw in the background will be put to work!


I've got a few pieces that I'm scratching my head on how to use, they are kind of strange shapes.....

Cheers!
 
Well I got it all processed on the bandsaw, sort of round now. I did have a bandsaw blade break, that will get your attention really fast!


The saw contained it without any drama. Broke right on the weld, but the blade was not new and I might have been pushing it a bit on this stuff.


On my last blade, so I need to get some more.


IMG_7826.JPG

This one might be a waste of time, a lot of wood to turn out the pith, and that crack seems rather deep.


IMG_7828.JPG

Here is a piece that I got creative with, if I made one large blank it would be really lopsided.....


IMG_7829.JPG

I sliced off the low side and then cut it in half, making two small tall blanks


IMG_7830.JPG

I'm thinking two small tall bowls that will be natural edge, might be interesting, I've not done a lot of natural edge stuff in a while.


IMG_7831.JPG

That is a fair bit of wood right there, not a ton, but will keep me busy for a while.


IMG_7832.JPG

IMG_7833.JPG



I think that this one will also make a very interesting tallish natural edge bowl.


now I have to paint on some white glue, that is what I use to seal up the endgrain on my blanks.


Cheers!
 
Was that tree dead for some time Stu ? The wood looks almost dry.

The wood that I took was actually limbs from a large tree. the tree is not dead, the wood is not dry, it had been sitting for almost a month cut :rolleyes: before they called me, but I checked it with my moisture gauge and on the highest setting of 25% it did not register, so that means it is over 25%.

Cheers!
 
That is some cool score! I have quite a few chinquapin oak pen blanks...e-bay I think. Beautiful wood! The resulting bowls will do great in your store!
 
I managed to score some chinkapin a while back, just small pieces (this is the NW golden - which is very different than the chinkapin oak wood wise). It turns really nice sort of like a finer grained and smoother cutting walnut. If the stuff you ended up with is half as nice you'll be really happy to have it.

Oh and the stuff I got was half rotten as well, maybe its a common problem with the tree?
 
That is some cool score! I have quite a few chinquapin oak pen blanks...e-bay I think. Beautiful wood! The resulting bowls will do great in your store!

I have a couple of pieces from cutting the pith out of the crotch piece that are destined for pen blanks, they should be very pretty!

I managed to score some chinkapin a while back, just small pieces (this is the NW golden - which is very different than the chinkapin oak wood wise). It turns really nice sort of like a finer grained and smoother cutting walnut. If the stuff you ended up with is half as nice you'll be really happy to have it.

Oh and the stuff I got was half rotten as well, maybe its a common problem with the tree?

This tree here is related to the NW Golden Chinkapin, but it is somewhat different, I know it is used a fair bit here for furniture and such, but not much anymore as it has been over harvested.

The tree that was rotten was maybe forty or more years old and I think it was at the end of it's life cycle and just needed to be taken down before it fell down in a typhoon or such.

OK, I got all the wood sealed up....


IMG_7834.JPG

Its all dry this AM


IMG_7835.JPG

That one piece that had the pith in it and a big crack I decided to give it a spin on the lathe, if it is junk, why not get it over with?
Boy is this wood wet, the splooge coming off the gouge is amazing, been a while since I've turned wet wood like this.


IMG_7836.JPG

I think it will be some pretty wood.
Going with a Natural Edge on this one (NE)


IMG_7841.JPG

I think I have the shape defined fairly well.


IMG_7842.JPG

Now it goes into the DNA bath overnight, then wrap it in paper and wait six weeks


IMG_7840.JPG

This wood must be closely related to oak, because the tannins in it are just making a mess, boy what a mess!


Cheers!
 
Stu just for me would you please take a few pics of how you chucked that piece up each time. I really need to getvit in my head how to start a turning like this. Have a bad habit of always going wrong way round.
Now one can see the moisture in that wood. Its cool to see u getting some shop time again.

Sent from my SGH-I337M using Tapatalk
 
OK Rob I'll do that!

Funny thing happened, when I went to put this one into my DNA, I found another bowl in the bucket!


Must have been in there soaking up that DNA for a few years any way.....


IMG_7845.JPG



It was about half full of mud from the DNA bucket.


I cleaned it up a bit


IMG_7847.JPG



IMG_7846.JPG

And I'm fairly sure it is Keyaki, or Japanese Elm.


IMG_7848.JPG

Wrapped it up with paper the way that I do, and it too will be ready to turn in a month to six weeks.


Cheers!
 
Stu just for me would you please take a few pics of how you chucked that piece up each time. I really need to getvit in my head how to start a turning like this. Have a bad habit of always going wrong way round...

Rob, have a look at this thread:

http://familywoodworking.org/forums/showthread.php?13180-Making-a-Natural-Edged-Walnut-Bowl

I do them about the same way, except I use a faceplate or spur center on the bark side. (Mark is using a "faceplate ring" that fits his chuck.) If I use a faceplate, I first use a beater chisel to cut a flat spot in the blank under under the bark. (You can see that's what Mark did in his pics.) If I use a regular spur center, I first drill a 1" diameter hole with a Forstner bit about 3/4" to 1" deep to put the spur center into, so the blank can't escape. Or I use my Oneway Big Bite chuck spur driven into the wood beyond the bark, held with the chuck. On a little bowl like the one Stu showed, I'd just use the regular 1" spur center.
 
Thanks Vaughn!

OK here is what I did today.

IMG_7852.JPG

I mark both sides of the blank, trying to get a center point.

IMG_7853.JPG

Then I drill the bark side, you can see that I'm through the bark, but I need to go deeper to get to the harder wood, through the cambium layer.

IMG_7854.JPG

There, that is deep enough, I'm using an 1-1/8" bit here.

IMG_7855.JPG

Remember to clean off the wet wood from your drill bits, they will stay sharp longer

IMG_7856.JPG

Getting ready to mount the blank, the banjo is in the way here, the blank is about 12" or so in diameter.

IMG_7857.JPG

IMG_7858.JPG

Mounted up, ready to make a mess!

IMG_7859.JPG

The outside is trued up, the bark side is still very wonky, so the blank is still very out of balance.

At this point I realized the I had mounted the blank backwards, I wanted to show Rob how I do the natural edge thing, and had my head in that space, but this piece I want to core out in the usual way, so I need to flip it to put the tenon on the bark side which will become the bottom of the bowl :doh:

I removed the blank from the lathe and swapped it, but I wanted Rob to see this pic.....

IMG_7860.JPG

You can see that the drive center has made a mess in the wood, it has chewed it's way into the soft wet wood.

IMG_7861.JPG

Flipped around and all trued up, the tenon is turned and ready for the chuck.

IMG_7862.JPG

IMG_7863.JPG


All chucked up and ready for the coring rig, but time had run out and I have to go and deliver some beer.....

IMG_7864.JPG

I use this stuff, I think it might be called "Flat Twine" to cover the whole blank, it will slow down the drying process, I hope to get back to it tonight, but one never knows, better to be safe than have a warped and or cracked blank.

Oh yeah, one essential tool you will need for this kind of turning.......

IMG_7865.JPG


..... is a good coal shovel....

coal%20shovel_1.jpg


.... very useful when cleaning up all them curlies!

Cheers!
 
A couple of things I do a bit differently: First, I drill the hole the same size as my spur center. In my case, that's 1". The 1 1/8" hole would work, although it would not hold the spur center quite as tightly when I do item #2...I drive the spur center into the blank with a dead blow hammer before I mount it on the lathe. That helps be avoid this kind of issue:

IMG_7860.JPG


Not implying you'd do it Stu, but I know some guys use a hammer to pound the blank onto the spur center when it's in the spindle. That's not a good idea, as it puts stresses on the main headstock bearings that they were not designed to take. Even if I'm mounting a piece of kiln dried spindle stock, I'll remove the spur center from the spindle, drive it into the blank, then mount the blank on the lathe. Even if the spur center doesn't stay in place as I mount the blank, it's easy to line up the blades of the spur with the "print" of the spur on the blank.
 
Good catch Vaughn, I did not pound it in this time, but even when I did in the other blank I had the same problem, this wood is just so very wet, and heavy the momentum of the wood just tears it up.
Next one I'll use my small face plate, should work better.
 
Top