I got real lucky this spring and picked up quite a few walnut logs. I cut the logs into sections and cut the sections in half and coated the ends and two inches down with a sealer and put them into the coolest part of my barn. I turn mostly in the fall and winter and it is getting time to further process these sections.
In the past I have turned mostly bowls and hollow forms and I turn them twice. In the near future I would like to start turning some boxes and would like to make blanks out of some of this walnut I have. For boxes, I anticipate making blanks, sealing them and turning them dry to completion "sometime in the future". I pretty much have bowl processing down but am unsure of what to do for boxes that I would like to turn dry.
I assume to make and dry blanks for boxes I would make squares of varying lengths, seal them and store them for a year per inch thickness. Right? Do you seal the entire blank? Can you store them on top of one another? Have you ever tried soaking "box blanks" in denatured alcohol?
Anyone out there make their own blanks for boxes? How do you process the logs?
I follow the process shown and described by Richard Raffan in his companion book and video on turning boxes. It would take several paragraphs to summarize and Shirley I would leave out some key points. I lose a very small percentage to drying cracks. You could weigh and record the weight on a few every week until weight loss stops, but I think they dry amazingly fast - just a few months.
I am at the point where I seal the whole piece with Anchor Seal.
Boxes - if you rough out the box in a shape of a box you want to make....to the point of hollowing out the inside...but only a little.....the blank dries faster. I cut the top part off and then hollow the bottom part and mark both parts so I can use the same block for the entire box. I have been know to tie them together with a piece of string to keep them together as they dry.
When I put them back on the lathe to re-turn them....I do not take them to finish thickness.....but make them round again and remove some of the wood and let them equalize a bit for maybe a week before I stick them back on the lathe for a third time and finish them. Every time you remove some of the wood.....the stresses in the blank move things.
Box blanks need to be rough turned, then dried, then turned again. Air drying lumber over 8/4 or 2 inches thick is difficult even for furniture pieces. 1 year per inch, then 6 months or more in a warmed shop. Even when I turn boxes from 'dry' stock, I still rough turn them because they 'adjust' when you remove mass. Over 2 inch diameter, and it is considerably damper on the inside than on the outside. Tape the top and bottom together so you don't mix them up. I think Richard Raffen has a video about doing it this way.
Ron -- You've received lots of good advice. To my mind, the most important thing for you to keep in mind is that what works well in my neck of the woods, Arizona, may not work well elsewhere. Arizona is very dry. Even in our 'monsoon season', its dryer than most anyplace else in the country at anytime of year. Unless you're also in Arizona, how much use would you find my estimate of an average drying time?
My point is that, when it comes to drying wood, an international forum like this can only be of limited help.
Haven't read what the others have said but i make a lot of blanks for ornaments, and boxes and maybe spindle turnings in general. What I do is when a log starts to split and I know I won't get around to turning bowls or other large things I go to the bandsaw. I then cut squares as big as I can at first and as long as I can handle on the bandsaw. Usually that's between 16 and 20" (think firewood size). I might get a 5x5 piece, and then some 4x4 or 3x3 and on down to 1x1 for finials and such. Sometimes I saw them into rectangles because I might end up using them for short wide boxes.
I seal the ends by dipping them in melted wax.
I put them up and weight them occasionally. When they stop losing weight I know they are dry. May take a year or more on larger pieces.
I really lose very little. I don't like to rough turn boxes and put them up because it means I have to make them that size when I get back to them. If I let the wood dry fairly large then I can make whatever box suits my fancy. When I get around to turning one I do turn them almost to size and let them sit up overnight to stabilize. I have made quite a few without doing this and they seem to be OK but If I want a really good fit especially with threaded lids I let them stabilize.
I rough turned several dozen years ago out of various woods. Lost very few. In general I agree with John. Don't turn them to a final shape that commits you to a design. Your taste may change and probably will. You can turn them round and hollow them slightly after cutting off the lid. Just drill a hole down the center may be enough to help reduce the stresses and allow for faster drying.
Theoretically if you keep the two pieces together they will warp and change similarly. If you have very consistent straight grained blanks the boxes will match up nicely and if they warp they will warp together and even though they might be slightly oval they will be matching ovals. This on't work for threaded boxes but may not be a disaster on loose lid boxes.
But. if you have wood with spectacular grain the warping may be more problematic. OTOH, spectacular grain looks great. For example, walnut that is part heartwood and part sap wood Can produce very interesting boxes if you can keep the grai match.
I process wood exactly like Sir Lucas except I use anchor seal on the ends instead of dipping in wax. The rule of thumb for drying lumber (1"/year+1 year) is shaky at best, but squares may dry faster since the moisture can exit on four sides instead of two. I process so much wood I have an excess so I generally let them dry a long time - some I'm using now have been air drying for over 10 years, some maybe 3-4 years. I use a pinless moisture meter to check the drying progress.
My squares are as long as the log section. When "good and dry" and ready to use I slice of a thing sliver from the end with the bandsaw and bend it - if it breaks easily there is a crack there so I keep removing slices until the crack is gone. Then cut my box blank a little longer then needed. I check the other end just in case.
Round and cut tenons and part off for the lid as usual, and rough out the inside as others mentioned. If using wood I know is wet I leave a lot of wall thickness when roughing then loosely tape the two haves with tenon ends together and let dry for some months. (I keep a roughed out lid from Dogwood to show people how much that wood can move - it is egg shaped, warped far to much to complete a box!)
If the blank is already quite dry (or when mounting a roughed out blank) I turn the outside nearly to final shape first and shape the inside to close to the final thickness and put them aside for at least overnight or a few days. I usually leave both pieces in chuck jaws for this to avoid having to deal with re-registration when remounting. (an advantage to having lots of chucks!) This not only lets any traces of residual moisture escape but it also lets any stresses in the wood relax. Then final turn.
I find that the last step of letting the blank "relax" for at least overnight generally results in lids that fit perfectly. Turned thin enough, even seasonal wood movement is minimized. BTW, I don't do suction fit lids to demonstrate skill - people like lids that are loose (but not sloppy.)
My recent experiments with boxes with threaded lids were done like this - nearly finish turned then let sit for several days before final turning and threading. So far the fit seems stable even after having them in several environments with and without conditioning. Time will tell how they hold up! Non-threaded boxes I've made have not had a problem as far as I know. I've kept some and they still fit the same 8-10 years later.
I went to the Symposium in Arizona a few years back. The ferules on the tools I took down still have not swelled up to fit again... Furniture places there do a big repair business for pieces that have moved in...
With threaded boxes, 1 1/2 inch diameter is pushing the limits for wood movement. I turned a number of threaded boxes in that size and slightly larger, and went from Oregon down to Davis CA for a show. The boxed dried out some more due to the drier climate. The lids would still come off, but would be tight/loose/tight/loose as I unscrewed them. Never sure if they ever go back to round once they move.
Oh, in Arizona, it was easy to tell the locals. They came through the convention center wearing long pants, and sweaters and jackets. There I was in shorts and T shirt sweating.....
One other thing that wasn’t mentioned. With any spindle stock that I get green, i will rough the squares to cylinders, rounding over the ends slightly. I don’t see the point of drying wood that I’m going to turn off eventually.
I turn quite a few boxes. I used to rough turn the blanks and soak them in denatured alcohol. Then I started rough turning the blanks as proscribed by Richard Raffan, taping the ends together and letting them air dry until I remembered where they were.
Now I decide what kind of box I am going to turn from the piece of wood at hand. I cut it to appropriate length and rough hollow leaving at least 1/2" of thickness. I tape the ends together and label the blank with a date and a name to remind me of what style I intended for the blank although I can usually tell by the general dimensions. I then put the blanks in buckets or boxes and promptly forget that they are there.
When I want to turn a specific style of box I dig through the buckets or boxes of blanks until I find something I wish to turn. Most of the time the masking tape label has come off but I can more or less tell by how the wood feels if it is dry enough to turn. Where I live wood seldom air dries below 14% anyway.
I chuck up the lid blank, true it up and turn the inside of the lid and rough shape the outside. I let that sit in the chuck at least over night. I usually turn at least 5 boxes at a time so I will have 5 lids sitting in chucks. i do all the steps described to all 5 box blanks. The next day I check to see how much the lids have changed, i.e. gone oval due to changes in moisture. Most of the time the change is imperceptible. So I finish turn the lid, make sure the sides of the lid are parallel, sand and finish the inside.
Next I do the same thing with the body blanks. I rough turn them cutting a tenon approximately the right size to fit the lid but not small enough to fit inside. I let the body sit overnight to equilibrate. The next day I taper the tenon on the body to just begin to allow the lid to fit on the taper. Once the lid will sit on the end of the taper I do more hollowing on the inside of the body and shape the exterior to close to finished dimensions. I continue to do this until I get the inside of the body to finished thickness. I then let the body sit overnight to equilibrate.
The next day I turn the tenon so I can jam fit the lid for finish turning. Once I can squeeze the lid on I support it with the live center and turn most of the finished shape. Turning generates heat and sometimes can cause the lid to expand and loosen. So I try to cut it only with sharp tools to minimize heat. Once the lid is turned I can sand and finish its exterior.
Back to the body where I can sand and finish the inside and outside except for the bottom which is attached to a tenon being held by the chuck. Once those areas are finished I can carefully go about fitting the lid. I prefer a suction fit that does not require a strong man to remove the lid. I would like for anyone to lift off the lid without much effort. The problem with box lids is that one day they fit snugly and the next day they are loose depending on humidity. So you pays your money and takes your chances as they say and do the best fitting job for the area where you expect the box to end up. Boxes going to areas of high humidity will expand and tighten up and boxes going to areas of low humidity will shrink and get loose. Cut the tenon to fit. Do not sand it to fit. Sanding results in an oval tenon and you can end up with the dreaded twist fit.
Once you are satisfied with the lid, you can part off the box and reverse turn the body and finish the bottom. The bottom should be finished to the same degree of finish as the rest of the box.
Rinse and repeat 5 times. By doing multiples and repeat the same steps time after time on different boxes it become much easier to get good results. Turning one off boxes gets one off results unless you turn a lot of boxes.
Mike -- Thank you for such a detailed description of your process. I learned a lot.
Also, thank you for the inspiration you've provided over the years. I have a picture of a box you made up by my lathe. It's been there for several years and has served as the template for several boxes I've turned. Maybe if I tried turning 5, using the process you described, I'd finally get the shape right!
David, thanks for the kind words. I guess I must have turned a hundred or more boxes before I got to the shape that pleased me and my wife and her artist friend.
Try placing something dark or light behind the sight line of the wood so you have a good background to see where you are in your shaping. I still use that technique and it allows me to "see" the shape better. It also doesn't hurt to step back from the lathe and take a long look at the shape. You can even unscrew the chuck and stand the box upright to better see the shape if you are having a difficult time translating the shape 90 degrees from the axis of rotation.
There are as many ways to turn boxes as there are ways to skin a cat. I have no idea what that means.....
Just keep turning boxes and trying harder to get the shape you want. Don't start with the most expensive or beautiful blanks you have. Practice on plain wood. When you can make a pretty box out of plain wood with the desired shape, good proportions and a nice fit and finish you are good to go.
Mike, thank you for the detailed reply. Just to confirm...you no longer treat your rough turned boxes with any kind of sealant (wax, anchor seal, etc.) or denatured alcohol.
When a stick of wood comes sealed with wax I scrape off the wax on the long sides leaving the wax on the ends to facilitate drying. When I am finally ready to use the stick I cut it into appropriately sized blanks based upon the box design I have in mind.
Then I form tenons on each end, round up the blank and part for the lid. I quickly rough hollow the two pieces and tape them tenon to tenon and place them in a bucket.
On occasion I will misjudge the dryness of the stick of wood and find that it is really wet inside. When that happens I will throw the the blank into a bucket of denatured alcohol for a day or two.
No matter what you do I think you will lose some blanks during the drying process. I have grown to expect that and when I find a nice blank that I have roughed buried in a bucket that has decided to split it gives me the opportunity to use words that I don't use frequently even if I only mutter them to myself.
But in general I don't lose all that many blanks. The best part of rough hollowing is that it gives you an opportunity to practice hollowing with a gouge. I use a Thompson 1/2" detail gouge with a 60 degree grind to quickly excavate the interior of a blank, nothing fancy just a quick and dirty removal of the excess wood. Just be careful that you don't over hollow the interior diameter either piece so that the lid cavity is too wide for the tenon you will cut on the body and the other way around in reverse. If the hole into the body of the box is too large in diameter it will be difficult to fit the lid depending on your box design.
Start out turning cheap wood into boxes and as your skills improve you can move on to exotics and other expensive materials.
P.S. The one thing I failed to mention is that you can't be in a rush to use a piece of wood that hasn't dried sufficiently for box making. You will achieve better results with wood as dry as your climate will allow. When I facetiously mentioned losing a box blank I have roughed in a bucket or box that "loss" is somewhat intentional. The longer that blank has to dry the better off I am when it comes to the final turning of the blank. I have roughed blanks sitting around that are probably 10 years old. Sometimes that provides interesting discoveries because the wood has darkened, is dirty and when you turn it all that wonderful color and figure is revealed again. That is what makes turning fun and by first rough turning and then finish turning later you get to enjoy the process twice.
>>>When a stick of wood comes sealed with wax I scrape off the wax on the long sides leaving the wax on the ends to facilitate drying. When I am finally ready to use the stick I cut it into appropriately sized blanks based upon the box design I have in mind.
That's a good point to mention. I do the same thing.
Many exotics come dipped in wax so they are usually still wet inside unless they are small and old. I use a cabinet scraper to remove wax on the sides and sometimes skim off the wax and a hair of wood with the bandsaw on the long sides. The latter also lets me see the color and figure and any cracks already under the wax. (I've paid good money for some useless wood with cracks hidden by heavy wax.)
I don't usually turn 2-4" squares round to dry quicker since i might decide later to rip them into smaller spindle blanks.
One thing I often do may sound a bit radical - I like to make a drawing of the intended box before roughing it. I have a notebook of sketches (actual size) of boxes I want to make. I'll select one design and a blank and rough to close to the final dimensions before the final drying. I'm not nearly as prolific as the legendary Mike Stafford so I can remember which drawing goes with which blank. I found that I designed by roughing without a drawing I my thoughts later usually included "What was I THINKING??"
Mike, I am happy to report that the lid of box you made for me years ago still fits the same as it did then. (Fits well, that is!)
I do what Richard Raffan does, but if I had 5 chucks, I'd probably do what Mike Stafford does -- he's produced a lot of beautiful boxes, so he's surely figured out how to do it right.
I have 50 - 60 taped-up pairs in boxes, anywhere from 6 months to 15 years old, so when I need to finish one on a tight deadline, I can get to the finish line pretty quickly. That comes in handy near graduation season, or whenever someone needs an affordable, hand-made gift item.
In my climate, I never seal them, but I rarely use exotic woods, which not only often come waxed (and cracked), but some are oily and don't dry anywhere near as fast as local hardwoods. On a high-priced or high-value piece of wood, I've been known to put the taped, rough-turned pair into a lunch-sized paper bag, but that's as far as I go.
