Anyone turned Redwood?

[artful bodger]

I may have the chance to cut up a big Redwood stump into some bowl blanks.
Has anyone turned this timber before, particularly bowls?. If so how did you go with it?, thoughts etc.
Not sure if it is the coastal type or giant mountain type.
Thanks

[bruceward51]

I turned a couple of bowls from sequoia - I think it is also called redwood? Very soft, hard to get a clean cut. Also had alternating hard and soft growth rings so very tricky to sand. The tree had grown in the Blue Mountains so quite fast grown I think. I found it similar to Oregon (Douglas fir) in many ways. I did not seek it out - bloke at the Men’s Shed was making benchtops for house house - a mistake in my opinion (and others) as it was far too soft. I turned him some bowls from offcuts.

[rtyuiop]

Yeah, similar experience here - soft and must be (carefully!) cut instead of scraped. Very easy to get waves during sanding due to the growth rings Bruce mentioned.

I do remember getting very different final colour with different finishing techniques (did a few pens) - had results which were quite dark or a much lighter pink from the same piece of wood. I think the pink came from getting the grain filled reasonably well.

I believe the US folks say there is considerable difference between a specimen which grew slow and gets tighter grain compared to a fast open grained tree...

Cheers,

Danny

[Paul39]

The USA stumps have some spectacular figure. I have turned some off cuts from salvaged deck lumber, not much figure and soft. Stump wood is likely to be denser than what is cut for building lumber. It might need a sanding sealer to not soak up too much oil finish and get dark.

If cheap or free definitely have a try, we can be surprised.

[wood spirit]

Only played with a small 6-7" branch offcut mostly using scrapers. Cretanly better than pine but propper turning tools will help. By the way young wood has little colour.

[clear out]

I turned up some posts for a terrace resto a while back.
The timber was old solid posts the neighbor scored from Luna Park.
I sawed them into 6 segments and used epoxy.
About 12’ long by 10” dia.
Dont remember any dramas but was probably using the saddle as they were parallel.
Used to have a Racal airstream respirator so would have been wearing that for sure.
H.