Spalted Willow Oak pen

I received this piece of wood in the pen turners swap box that toured the country… continent actually, as we had participation north of the border.

SteveN added these as a supplemental challenge blank (to the Cherry Burl Karson put in… that I’m “working up towards”) we were encouraged to take one, and see what we could make of it. The wood was described as flaky, and difficult to turn. It was pre-treated – vacuum treated with water based poly, I guess that did the trick to help us work our way through the punkiest bits.) You can see all the blanks, and their introduction in the comments portion of this stage of the blog series: http://lumberjocks.com/itsme_timd/blog/6174

So far we’ve found the wood pretty easy to turn, but a bit harder to get a perfectly smooth finish, given the open pore structure of the wood. It took the finish great, and had a nice tactile feel to it. I love the interplay of the colors.

Willow Oak is one of the red oaks, distinguished by it’s willow like leaves. It’s one of the most popular trees in horticultural plantings, and is very important to wildlife due to its heavy acorn production.

Here are (to date) two other pens made from the same wood: http://lumberjocks.com/projects/tag/391bchallenge
Lets get turning people… there is a challenge still to finish. : http://lumberjocks.com/Karson/blog/8102
391 Cherry Burl Pens to date: http://lumberjocks.com/projects/tag/391bchallenge
and the “open” category entries to date: http://lumberjocks.com/projects/tag/391xchallenge

This is the 12th project in my 30 projects in 30 days challenge

cross posted on Facebook: B C Woodworking
this and other projects, for sale on Etsy: B C Woodworking

-- I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso -- http://blanchardcreative.etsy.com -- http://snbcreative.wordpress.com/