End grain Black Walnut cutting board

Great job Hal! You just can’t beat walnut!

-- Dan Siggers, Alabama, http://www.siggerstraditionsllc.com

Gorgeous!!

-- Lew- Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!

Very nice!

-- Use it up, Wear it out --------------- Make it do, Or do without!

Nice! How long was it cut before being sanded and finished? Was it dried in some secret manner to prevent splitting/checking/cracking?

-- Dennis, WV

What a great looking board.
I am also curious if it was just the luck of the draw or was there a special drying technique used?

-- Scott Smith, Southern Illinois

I cut this walnut early last Summer. The tree produced 3 logs 12’ long. The top log was almost all rotten. The solid part of the log was only a little over 3’ long. I cut 1/2 of it into 1 1/2” slices. I brought several of them inside and they dried without cracking. The slices I left stacked with the boards from the first two logs, cracked so bad they were useless and went in the burn barrel. Before stacking them, I gave them one defrost cycle in the microwave. None of the microwaved slices cracked.

-- Hal, Tennessee http://www.first285.com

Thanks for the info.

-- Scott Smith, Southern Illinois

Nice one , Hal. It is good that it dried without cracking! Merry Christmas….......Jim

-- Jim Jakosh.....Practical Wood Products...........Learn something new every day!!

Microwave huh? Those must not be as big as they look ( or you have a bigger microwave than I have!). What is the diameter of those. I would like more detail on the microwave process: “one defrost cycle” for how long? then stored inside with no finish/preservative for how long before you sanded/ finished ? Do you think this process would work for oak?

-- " I'll try to be nicer, if you'll try to be smarter" gfadvm

I use the microwave to dry small items I turn on my lathe. I don’t have the patience to rough turn something and wait 6 months to see what it’s going to look like… So, I weigh the item, and record the green weight. After it’s cooled to room temperature, select defrost (50% power setting works too) and put in the weight in ounces. My microwave calculates the time. Each time I heat the item, I let it cool back to room temperature and weigh it. When it stops loosing weight, it’s dry. To calculate the moisture content of wood I’ve sawed on my sawmill, I also put it in the oven at 170 degrees overnight to get it bone dry and record that weight. It will gain weight as moisture is absorbed from the air. This cutting board was 12” in diameter and it fit in a regular microwave. A 16” rolling pin also fits, if it’s placed from corner to corner at an angle.

-- Hal, Tennessee http://www.first285.com

Thanks Hal. And I got your pm.

-- " I'll try to be nicer, if you'll try to be smarter" gfadvm

Great glue up man, I can harldy see the lines :). Really a nice simple item, well sanded well done. Merry Christmas man!

-- I came, I was conquered, I was born again. ἵνα ὦσιν ἓν

Beautiful Work! I love the end grain!

Nate

-- "With a little bit of faith, and some imagination, you can build anything!" Nate

Hal,

Beautiful Work!

After looking at the National Hardwood Lumber Association Weights Chart on Walnut I noticed that if you devide the green weight by 1.53 you should have the dry weight of each piece. Would you happen to still have your weights before and after drying to check that against?

I’m just curious and am trying to microwave (experimenting) some small GREEN end grain, walnut blocks (4 – 7/16” thick X 4” X 4” at a time) using the microwave. I’m using kg instead of pounds, ounces because my scale reads the kg in hundredths instead of X amount of ounces! My blocks are dropping from .11kg to .07kg with 2 – 3 mins micro cycles and 1 – 2 mins cycle, all @ full power. I place 1 sheet of dry paper bag material under for each setting and as soon as I remove the pieces from the MW I stand them on end and let them steam and cool off, while I run another set in. It seems to be working really well. I noticed you are using 50% power setting, any special reason?

BTW: I have dried 138 of thes blocks without a crack!

-- There was only one perfect carpenter... It wasn't me!

You could use a limb about 4” dia. and slice it up for some Coasters!
They would be COOL & NICE!

-- Have Fun! Joe Lyddon - Alta Loma, CA USA - Home: http://www.WoodworkStuff.net ... My Small Gallery: http://www.ncwoodworker.net/pp/showgallery.php?ppuser=1389&cat=500"