In article ,
Stuart wrote:

This is a topic I know nothing about.

A friend of mine had a cherry tree chopped down and offered me some pieces
of it.

The largest is roughly 400mm diameter x 200mm long (far too big for my
lathe), there are a couple of pieces 150mm d x 160mm l and some 70mm d x
200mm l.

Advice on how to season these properly for turning please.

Stuart

Stuart,

The largest bowl blank that you will get out of the 400mm x 200mm is
200mm. To get a bowl blank, you split the the log length wise in half,
so you will have 2 pieces 400mm wide x 200mm long x 200mm thick.When you
cut it in half, you want to cut it through the pith, which is the center
of the growth rings. doing so, one piece may be thicker than 200mm, and
the other will be less than 200mm. The length, not the diameter,
determines the diameter of the bowl. When to cut a 200mm circle out of
your 400mm x200mm piece, it should fit fine on your lathe.