On Fri, 15 Jul 2005 09:23:48 -0700, mac davis
wrote:

I've done at least a hundred boxes, but all out of dry or seasoned wood... now
that I'm turning wet wood, I'm having to learn all over again!

You can say that again. My first one was out of a laminated blank of
kiln-dried mahogany, and it was a whole different experience than
sopping wet cherry!

The problem with turning thin is that though it minimizes cracking, it
encourages warping... IMO, warping is cool in bowls but not in boxes, because
the lid never seems to warp in the same direction..

So far, I've been all right- I've only had a bowl from a wet oak burl
cap warp on me, but that was some squirrely stuff all around. Looked
nice, but it was certainly a challenge.

My best solution so far is to turn the box and lid thin, except the box opening
and the part of the lid that fits in the box.. I leave a tenon on the end of
each and enough wood there to true them up when they're dry.. (I hope, they're
still drying)

I turned the lid on the last one out of some very dry mesquite, so
that wasn't much of a concern. From what I can tell, the cherry box
is dry, or darn close, and it has survived. Hopefully, I can still
say that several weeks from now, but it's looking good so far!

I have a bunch of very fancy kindling from my first batch of boxes turned to
about final fit green and dried.. lol

Yep. I need to get myself a fire ring- seems like I had a run of
beginner's luck with the first couple dozen things I turned, and now
it seems that there's about equal odds of any project either exploding
on the lathe or coming out beautifully. Some of that is is using
deadfall that is partially rotted, some of it is trying new
techniques, but it sure makes a lot of firewood in any case!