collecting your own burl woods

[Scott Roush]

Does anybody try to find and harvest their own burl wood for handles on this forum?  Living up here in northern Wisconsin amongst all this maple and birch got me to thinking about looking for my own. Especially after I've been pricing the stuff. I mean.. I've seen plenty of trees with burl like growths on them. So I was just wondering about the process of cutting it, seasoning it and stabilizing it.  btw... I've got hundreds of acres in which I can get the permission I need to harvest...

[B M A]

Cutting and seasoning will be the easy part of your endeavor.  As for stabilizing you will need to send it out.  Lin Rhea has posted before a source he uses to have wood stabilized.  Contact him and he will give that to you.

[Lin Rhea]

Yes, Ray Kirk out of Oklahoma offers several types already stabilized. Better check with him though to be sure.
 [email protected]

Sometimes I cut my owm, but it takes a good wait in a drying cabinet before they are ready. They still need to be stabilized after that too. Lin

[Scott Roush]

Thanks...

As far as cutting... is it just a matter of prying off the burl and slicing through it for your blanks?

Do you treat the cut parts of the burl with something to prevent splitting during drying?

Is there a moisture content that you wait for on the drying? Or how do you know when it's well seasoned and dry?

Can you get away with penetrating epoxies and Minwax hardeners for stabilization?


Sorry for all the questions!  But thanks a lot...

[Lin Rhea]

Always cut the pieces oversize and wax the end grain ends. Just melt some parrafin and dip the ends a little.

I dont have a target moisture content. I do check it every so often and get a feel for how much it moves and let it stay in the drying box a while even after that.

I do use Minwax when I think its needed and that could be every time with some woods. I wait till I have the handle 90% shaped before I apply the wood hardener so as not to sand it away. Unless you pull a vacuum on it, it will only go so deep.

I dont use woods I harvest unless I am certain it's ready and I take precautions to seal it good. It's not worth the risk if a lot is riding on it and most times it is.    Lin

[Scott Roush]

Thanks Rhea... It's starting to come together in me noggin.

As to the actual burl (or big gnarly knot coming off the tree)... Is that the piece that you are actually slicing into the flakes..? or the vertical wood underlying it?  The reason why this is a confusion for me is because of what I'm reading in Bo Bergman's knife making book about this exact topic. He mentions that you pry the burl off after cutting 8" above and 8" below it.... but then use the 'vertical' section of wood.  I'm confused about what he means by 'vertical'.  If you've ever read this book.. there are many similar confusing statements.

Thanks again....

[Lin Rhea]

I usually buy the good stuff. I cut the pieces I actually harvest from the crotch of the tree. It seems that is where the material swirls and looks best. I would rather buy  my wood unless I get a little time to mess with it. But I do indeed harvest some. Lin

[Scott Roush]

Lin.... when you harvest wood from the crotch... are you looking for curly or bird's eye grain... or burl wood (knotty growth)? Or does the effect of the burl extend to a nearby crotch? Man I'm confused on this for some reason!

Here is what I'm talking about:

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burl

So.... looking at that big knotty growth on that tree... is it a simple matter of prying that thing off, seasoning it, stabilizing it, and cutting slices out of it for handles?

Sorry to be so dense!

[Lin Rhea]

I have no experience drying burl, but if it's like most woods, you would cut it in slightly oversized pieces and stack it till it's ready. Cut it first and then dry the pieces after they are managable. It would take less time to dry. Stabilize them after they are dry.  

From the pictures on Wikapedia I would think you'd have to cut the tree down on some of the examples. If I was to try one of those, I'd chainsaw the burl till I could get it into a large table saw and cut the pieces the way I want them and dry them. Lin

[4runr]

From my experiences, leave the burl whole and intact until dry. It takes a long time to dry that way, 2-3 years, but then you don't end up with mostly unusable pieces of kindling.

I read that on a site some years ago but didn't want to wait that long. I tried to cut them in oversized pieces. After it was dry it warped and checked so badly that most was unusable.

[Jeremy]

What Kenny said.  I have a few large peices of cherry burl that has been drying for 2-3 years and I'm still not ready to cut it up, but they're BIG suckers!  Not sure what I'll end up with, but it's worth a try.

To harvest the burls you cut down the tree/limb and cut above and below the burl.  For really big ones you can chainsaw them in half vertically (ie parallel to how the tree was growing)

If you want to cut the burl up into smaller pieces, dip the entire oversize piece into wax!  You need it to dry S-L-O-W-L-Y!  There's a specialty wax carvers use that'll still allow it to dry... can't remember the name, but a quick search should find it.

[Scott Roush]

Thanks guys....

What about painting it?  I'm new to knife making but I've been making longbows and when you harvest, say, a piece of osage, painting the end grain slows the drying process out. So what if you cut it and then painted pieces? I suppose you would risk having the paint seep too far into the wood... probably not a good idea.

[markfromark]

I'm no knife maker, but I know a little about drying wood.  If you painted an entire piece it would take a long, long time for it to dry since you would basically have the whole piece sealed.  Your best bet is to just plan on letting it dry on the shelf for a good while with the end-grain sealed (if you use paint, latex works best).  I've been told that you need to allow a year per inch of thickness for non-burl woods.  I'd expect it would be about the same for burls.

I turn quite a bit of burl on my lathe and I buy most of that wood already dried (either air or kiln).  But some of it is green and I air dry it myself.  The faster it dries the more likely it will be to warp and check.  One thing I do to help slow down the drying is to wrap the piece in newspaper.  If you're drying a solid piece then I'd say just put it inside a brown paper bag and close off the opening.  

Sorry if I'm telling you guys something you already know.  Just tryin' to share what little bit I know and have learned thru experience.

Mark

[Scott Roush]

I reallly appreciate it Mark. I know very little.

If I were to cut the burl into slabs, would I still only seal the end grain??

[4runr]

The problem with sealing the end grain on burls is the grain goes every which way. Which is the end?

[Scott Roush]

ahhhh... that makes sense.

[markfromark]

True about the burls... pieces of burl that I've bought off auction sites are normally completely sealed with wax.  I've trimmed off some smaller pieces before I put it on the lathe.  Those pieces have all dried w/o checking or warping noticeably.  They were sealed on one side only, so maybe there's something to that?  I dunno.  

I have started keeping most of my cutoffs in a pile and I need to share with you knife makers.  Most of the pieces are big enough for handle slabs.  I'll try and remember to post up some of these occasionally and see who can use them.

[ALW]

Just wondering why you have to stabilize burl wood?  If you let it dry/cure for several years until it's dried out, why do you have to stabilize it?  Just wondering.  I know guys stabilize spalted wood, I guess to harden it up where the fungus has softened it and gave it the nice color.  But I figured the burl wood would be OK once it was completely cured.  Thanks.

Aaron

[Scott Roush]

I guess I was only thinking to stabilize it if it were punky.  For some reason I always assumed that burl could be a bit punky. If it doesn't need to be stabilized then all the better!