On Jul 26, 4:27 pm, "Toller" wrote:
I cut a 18" crab apple log in half, sketched out an 12" circle on each, and
roughly trimmed it with the chainsaw. Unfortunately it was way too big to
fit on my bandsaw, but it would have bound anyhow.

I screwed a faceplate to the flat surface and ran the tail piece into it.

Well, the lathe shook like crazy, and thunked pretty badly each time a high

If you don't have the ability to nibble down the blank before mounting
it on the lathe you can take some time to balance it between the
headstock spur drive and the tailstock. Mount it just so it stays
between centers, watch it roll to the heavy side and then try moving
the tailstock end a tad towards the light side, let go, repeat until
balanced. Then tighten it down and rough. I've had my Jet 1236 waltz
me around the garage once until I tried balancing the piece better and
now even bigger pieces don't make it rock.


On a completely different issue, the crapapple has pretty streaks of red
running though it, mixed with brown and white. Is that going to last?

Check out my Crabapple pot:
http://www.liwoodworkers.org/gallery... %27s+Turnings
This branch was at least 8 or 9 years old and dry as a bone. There was
a bit of punk that I firmed up with CA but the pot came out quite nice
and very colorful. Unfortunately I don't have any left and have since
had the tree removed. Overall I'd have to say crabapple is my favorite
"local" wood. All fruit woods seem to have more color and life to them.