Dealing with troublesome shrinkage

[Yanis]

I have a few stands of a mallee called Bushy Hate and it never grows too big but is very dense and hard but brittle. It is not all that great to turn but finishes to a really nice grain and lustre so is worth the effort.

I have made some mallets from it but it splits really badly as it dries, but it does dry quite fast, no idea why but in six months the larges pieces are more or less bone dry.

I made a mallet for my nephew and it was still too wet (I did not have a moisture meter but have since remedied that) and it developed a spit down the side. Fortunately the split was fairly straight so after much thought I decided to resaw it and fill the resaw with a contrasting timber.

So I carefully ran the mallet through the bandsaw straight down the line of the crack. I then resurfaced the cut faces to remove the bandsaw marks and the remainder of the split. I face jointed and resawed a short offcut of Jarrah panneling I had and then ran it through the thicknesser to make it about 5 mm thick.

I wanted a way to register the two halves of the mallet on the jarrah piece so I placed one of the mallet halves onto the jarrah and drilled a series of small pilot holes around the edge of the mallet and drove in nails to hold the two pieces in alignment.

I then glued the mallet pieces to the jarrah. After the glue dried I removed the nails and removed most of the jarrah overhang with a hand saw and band saw. I then chucked up the mallet in the lathe and re-turned it sanded and applied my home made beeswax/BLO finish. I am quite please with the result.

Thanks to Frank Howarth for the idea of resawing and replacing the remove timber with a contrasting wood.

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[Paul39]

Yanis,

Almost everything I have gotten here in the US in the round has split. When I cut green timber I slab it quickly for bowls, or at least split it in half and stack loosely bark side up so that it can shrink without a lot of checking.

If I have smaller limbs for tool handles I split them into halves or quarters and let dry.

If you don't have enough thickness to halve or quarter the piece, you could cut or split down the middle, which will let it dry quicker, and put a contrasting stripe down the middle as you did above. That looks very nice.

[hurcorh]

I can't help you really but I just have to say if I didn't know this was the woodwork forums from the title of this post I wouldn't be sure what to expect! :U

[Yanis]

I can't help you really but I just have to say if I didn't know this was the woodwork forums from the title of this post I wouldn't be sure what to expect! :U


Ooooo you are so naughty!

[Yanis]

Yanis,

If I have smaller limbs for tool handles I split them into halves or quarters and let dry.

If you don't have enough thickness to halve or quarter the piece, you could cut or split down the middle, which will let it dry quicker, and put a contrasting stripe down the middle as you did above. That looks very nice.

Exactly what I was thinking. I have a lot of fallen timber from these trees that is dry. Some of it can be cut an joined like this whereas others have multiple spiral splits all along its length. Firewood. But it is quite resinous so polishing it with its own shavings gives it a really nice lustrous finish.

John

[hughie]

Yanis,

Almost everything I have gotten here in the US in the round has split. When I cut green timber I slab it quickly for bowls, or at least split it in half and stack loosely bark side up so that it can shrink without a lot of checking.

If I have smaller limbs for tool handles I split them into halves or quarters and let dry.

If you don't have enough thickness to halve or quarter the piece, you could cut or split down the middle, which will let it dry quicker, and put a contrasting stripe down the middle as you did above. That looks very nice.

Yup in the round or with the pith it will crack/split etc.

[cava]

I think it is great how you solved the problem, and it came up a treat with the contrasting timber. :2tsup: