Purpleheart Question

Heat, get a couple of heat lamps and get setup. Try to keep it lowish. Someone did a hole study on a website you could probably find.

I made a picture frame out of Purpleheart, after I milled it and used the router on it I would let it sit on my assembly table under the skylight and the beauty would return in a couple of days.

-- Ron Central, CA

Hi sIKE;

Great question, and this time I can be of no help. I haven’t used Purple Heart since 1983, ( I remember due to a nightmare project we used it on).

But I am Very interested in getting the answers to this.

Lee

-- by Lee A. Jesberger http://www.prowoodworkingtips.com http://www.ezee-feed.com

Lee,

I was hoping for more, it looks like we have a dark horse in the race….heat. I hadn’t even considered that as a possibility.

Thanks!

-- //FC - Round Rock, TX - "Experience is what you get just after you need it"

I found the site I had read
http://www.organicsculpture.com/Purpleheart.html

Interesting

I’ve worked with quite a bit of purpleheart, and the grey/brownish color happens when its exposed to air/sun for too long. When you first cut it, it’ll be purple…(*you might need to clean the surface to see it well). It’s pretty forgiving, I’ve found. I have a guitar that I’ve been meaning to finish for about 2 years, and it’s still a rich purple color. I keep it out of the sunlight, and it’s been fine.

To keep the purple luster, I used a few coats of semi-gloss poly. I am going to experiment with various treatments on some scraps to see what happens.

..Marcb, just checked out that link. It’s really informative.

-- When my wife ask's what I have to show for my wood working hobby, I just show her the splinters.

When you plane purple heart it loses some of it’s rich color, get it to final thickness and then place in the sun for a couple of days and the color comes back. don’t leave it in the sun after it’s finished though, it will start turning a brownish color if exposed to uv light for too long.
i love working with purple heart, nice smell and works very well.

-- Joey, Magee, Ms http://woodnwaresms.com