Preparation/Preservation of burl

[Kelly E Jones]

Guys,

A year or so ago, I found and dug up a bigleaf maple burl. Not knowing just what to do with it, and being in a rush, I half-buried it in some damp sawdust (to keep it from drying and splitting), covered it in plastic, and left it outside. And promptly forgot about it. I just dug it up, and it doesn't look too much worse for the wear, excpet for an insect infestation under the bark.

My questions are:

1) What can I do with this? It occurred to me to make a bowl (or two), but this would effectively turn most of the wood into sawdust. I also thought some bandsawn boxes would be nice. Any other suggestions?

2) How do I prepare this wood? Saw it into chunks, coat in paraffin, and let dry a few years?

3) Assuming I want to keep a natural 'edge' on this, how is this surface typically cleaned/finished? Does one use sandblasting, or ???

Some pics of the burl:

?action=ShowPhoto&PhotoID=8Thanks,Kelly

[Pounds on Wood]

It looks like it could be a nice burl. You might try selling it on ebay or whatever. These are valuable, if you spend the labor cutting this into manageable, shippable sizes. Otherwise look for a burl dealer.

You can make bowls with very little waste. Do a google search for "bowlsaver" - ah never mind - just go here:

Burl is valuable enough to invest in equipment to maximize the yield.

Sawing it up will help lessen the loss to checking. It certainly needs to be coated in sealer whether you saw it or not. Hopefully it is not too late for that - cannot tell much from the photos. Parafin works very good, or you can get green wood sealer to paint on instead of messing with melting wax. I think wax does a better job at least on smaller pieces.

Power washing. Don't sand blast unless that is a look you are going for. Search "natural edge turning" for ideas on what to make.

This page has a nice example of what can be done with that burl:

> Some pics of the burl:

Welcome. Try over at rec.crafts.woodturning for more helpful folks.

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******** Bill Pounds