"Toller" wrote in message
...
I cut up a piece of crab apple; the main trunk just before it split into 4
trunks.

One half is very light and porous; I would call it willow if I didn't know
where it came from.
The other half is heavy and solid; pretty much what you would expect from
crab apple.
From the outside they looked to be the same.

Is something like this common? Anyway to determine it before cutting? I
am just lucky I cut it in half on the axis I did.

I have turned one bowl from the light side. Terrible tearout and it would
have absorbed as much LBO as I threw at it, but it turned out nicely. I
am hoping the hard half will be even better.

Brown rot? Common in trees that are pruned. Apple is as prone to it as
cherry. When it gets to the point of cubical rot, the wood's absolutely
unusable.

White rot eats lignin, so you develop structural problems earlier in the
process than with brown, a cellulose-eater.

Sound wood is always easier to finish.