Woodborg wrote:


Upto now i have been turning bowls from large diameter logs, cut either
side of middle to remove heart wood, rough shaped then dipped in the
LDD. My question is for the smaller branches of less than 8" in
diameter. How do you use these, because if you remove the heartwood
their wood be nothing left. I would guess these would be spindle
turned, but do you have to have them completly dried to stop the
different drying rate from middle to out side?
I'm asking this as my dad has a willow tree thats a bit tall and needs
reducing by 50 percent and i would like to make something out of the
small logs because it brings back memories as a small child climbing up
this tree
Mark



I'm going to go against the grain a bit on this one. I've turned a fair
number of odds and ends with the pith In - I'm pretty tight with a
dollar. Among those odds and ends are some willow mushrooms with bark
left on the base and cap - I usually do these by turning offset between
centers and then chucked to give a bit of angle to the stalk. You can
also get a nice oval base and cap by using the whole branch. Some of the
willow was air dried in the shed with zero protection on the ends - I'm
not recommending this, but I had only a small amount of checking on the
ends. I suspect that there are a number of species of willow, but the
wood I turned was a bit 'muddy' though it had an interesting color
variation - mostly yellowish.

Since this the wood is free and not real high quality, it is a perfect
opportunity for you to experiment. Have fun making memory markers!

LD