I had a friend bring me a piece of split firewood because he thought the color was different. The outside had turned a reddish brown. To work within the confines of the split log I was able to come up with this shape. I believe it may be apple. The ring and inset are Padauk. 

I have been on again and off again about this experiment using my power carver. Everyone else seems to like it so I went ahead and made a lid so I could take it up to the store and get it off my bench. I believe the wood is Black Cherry but not positive as it was from a log left outside my shop. Same with the lid which appears to be some rot damaged maple.

I’ve seen several other wood turners using the metal reactive paints and wanted to try for myself. Good old Santa left some in my stocking this year so I rushed out to the shop to try and was absolutely blown away by the results. I did try several methods to apply the paint – first coat I used a sea sponge, not perfect. The second coat I used a foam brush but I still detect “brush strokes”. I think on the next I will spray the paint on to get a smoother copper finish but after applying the activator most of the brush strokes are only apparent on close examination. This one is a late Christmas gift for my son who is a metal artist — he should appreciate it!

After a lengthy vacation and getting the shop ready for cold weather I was finally able to complete a couple of projects. This piece of oak (or maybe pecan) was sitting out behind my shop for a long, long time and when I cut into it I found some very nice spalting. It was a bit “spongy” which necessitated gluing a piece of hardwood on the bottom for good attachment to the lathe but I rather liked the look so I turned that into a foot. I also didn’t want to go too small so I left the bark inclusion on the side which also added to the appeal of the piece. I have more photos which I have yet to process of this and some other piece of late.

After battling a post-trip head cold I was finally able to make some dust. This project I actually started before leaving and finally finished up. Had a few short boards of what I suspected was black cherry. the grain was so figurative that I had to use them in a pot. The only ways was to do another segmented one. I think this urn gives you the idea. The smaller pieces are more of the maple counter top that I made the other segmented vessels from. The top and bottom are the standard cherry I usually use.

I hadn’t done a totally segmented piece for some time. I have had a tonne of old maple counter top sitting in my shop for 25 years and this is the perfect kind of project to start using that up. Each piece in the counter top was 2″ x 2″ which dictates the size of the segments a bit but I only used about 1 1/2 ” for the height of each. The grain figure is very pronounced and the cherry accents it very well. The cherry has been out there even longer as I had a few boards left from when I fabricated cherry trim for my family room 30 years ago.