Milling Peppercorn stump at Tim's place

**dai sensei** · 1st February 2014, 10:00 PM

Further to this thread https://www.woodworkforums.com/f132/m...3/#post1742577 on Tim's Peppercorn tree, we decided to attack the main stump today with the water blaster since it was >40 here. We found a lot was rotten with beautiful grain, but as it was end grain with a few rocks (mainly limestone but also some flint

) here and there, we thought it best try for a possible table base and decided to give it a bash with his Lucas

. Better to stuff a few teeth and my slabbing chain

.

Turned it in every direction propping with other timbers until we thought we had it right to mill down the top, that would become the table base bottom. That took all morning

. The timber was amazing, spalting/burl/birdseye etc, so we thought box makers would like it and milled it in 200 deep x 150 wide boards. His bandsaw has a 150mm throat, so it could be milled into smaller boards afterwards or kept as smaller turning blanks.

milling down table bottom.jpg slices1.jpg slices2.jpg burl slice.jpg stump top3.jpg

The final top surface of the trunk, the future table base bottom, looked amazing. If it could have been dried without splitting into multiple pieces it would have been worth milling as slabs.

table base3.jpg stump top1.jpg

Next was preparing a level platform to invert the stump onto. So we slung a blackwood and yellow stringy logs into the milling bay and took their tops off (we can finish them some other day). Then after placing a few stingers of 2" planks we placed the inverted stump on top.

milling platform.jpg flipped ready to level.jpg

Then as Tim's back was playing up, I got to use the Lucas

and slice the roots off level

. Hopefully Tim took some photos of me milling

We kept slicing until we achieved a point where a glass top could be supported well. This left a base 450mm high which is pretty good for a coffee table albeit huge

.

table base.jpg table base1.jpg table base2.jpg table base4.jpg

Now comes the long painful task of removing the remaining bark, rocks and crap then sanding sanding sanding

, but that will be after I'm gone

. As a lot is rotten, Tim will probably need quite a few coats of Timber Hardener before applying the final coats. This will eliminate an oil finish, so he could use NCL or similar lacquer.

The final table base is ~2.6m long and 1.8m wide weighing ~300kgs soaking wet. Dry it should be ~200kgs but make a beautul coffee table at a coffee shop lounge somewhere

.

Cheers

**Tim Creeper** · 1st February 2014, 11:00 PM

'sept Neil said it all. so here's some more picks jus' 'cause I can. Plus of course the one of Neil using the mill. And that was the end of another busy day and sooooo hot!

I must say that I actually enjoyed the water spraying off the blade of the saw.

**artme** · 2nd February 2014, 05:15 AM

Woodus spectabulus

!!!

That's the sort of stuphph usually found by Mapleman.

**dai sensei** · 17th February 2014, 11:37 PM

Whilst at George's place (see https://www.woodworkforums.com/f132/milling-georges-182044) I thought I would cast one piece of rotten cracked lump of peppercorn for a lidded hollow form. George casts his stuff at 100psi (most others have pots that can only do 40psi). I had already roughed it round, so made a timber chamber out of pine to cast it in, then wrapped in it a blue plastic bag to help debond it from the form. Chucked it in the pressure pot with 1.3 litres of runny resin and left it overnight to soak/set.

peppercorn mold.jpg cast2.JPG cast1.JPG cast3.JPG cast4.JPG

It developed a few cracks in the top where the resin was pretty thick, but most were being turned away anyway, but it only had a couple of cracks else where. After sanding the ends flat I used holt melt glue to again attached the pine spigots I used to turn it previously. I then turned it again round and then coated it with CA to seal it all and fill some cracks in the resin.

cast peppercorn1.jpg cast peppercorn2.jpg Cast peppercorn3.jpg

I finish turning it some other time when I have access to my own tools, I'm currently using George's lathe and limited chisels. But boy does this have promise, the grain is amazing.

Cheers

**artme** · 18th February 2014, 02:24 PM

That looks totally delicious!!!

**Tim Creeper** · 21st February 2014, 11:39 AM

Originally Posted by dai sensei

I finish turning it some other time when I have access to my own tools, I'm currently using George's lathe and limited chisels. But boy does this have promise, the grain is amazing.

Cheers

Surely you don't mean we have to wait till you get home? I don't know about anyone else but I feel I've been led to water and someone pulled the plug.

No fare dude!

**dai sensei** · 21st February 2014, 06:09 PM

Originally Posted by Tim Creeper

Surely you don't mean we have to wait till you get home? ..

Hopefully not that long. I was hoping to have a go yesterday when I was at a woodworking club at Salisbury but didn't happen. Was there for the whole day, but most of the day was spent yakking, eating and prepping for demo I gave that night on pendant making

. Perhaps next unpack of trailer

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