After reading all the posts it sounds to me like reaction wood is my problem. I was using a splitter when this problem happened. I did however get through this particular piece though (see below). I am not crazy about the idea of throwing the wood out since it was over $100 and I'm pretty cheap (that $ could be a new tool).
I'm pretty sure it was dried properly. I purchased it from Owl Hardwoods which is a pretty good chain in June. I have left it to dry on a drying rack with 1/2" spacers between each board for an additional 4 months in my basement and the AC has been on all summer to remove humidity (there is no exposed ground/gravel in the basement, just concrete all around and 2 covered and sealed sump pumps)
The method I used to cut this wood was:
-Remove the splitter.
-Pull the board off of the blade
-Lower the blade and rip 2/3 the height of the board on the first pass (this would not allow the reactive wood to twist)
-Flip it over and cut the remaining 1/2 o the height (it did twist/ warp, but there was far less exposed blade so it did not bind)
As was suggested that particular piece was smaller than intended due to the multiple passes so I made it straight again on the jointer and will save it for a later project. I started over with some of the remaining wood from the original
9" (minus 2.5 from the messed up board). This time I ripped it using the method above with an extra 1/4" so that I could fix any warping on the jointer and end up with the correct dimensions.
Anyone see anything wrong with this? CarlC suggested that it will always be prone to twisting... Do you mean after it is finished? If it is now cut, square and straight will it twist some time in the future (like after my project is completed and sealed)? The wedge idea sounds like a good one too, I did think of that but there was not enough room when using the splitter (the wood had not made it past the splitter yet). Thanks for all the advice, Dave