# Digging through the pile....



## Burlkraft (Oct 15, 2006)

I was looking for a piece of wood yesterday which caused me to dig through the piles and I came across this little beauty that I had forgotten all about.......











It's a coffee root burl from Cambodia...

It turns nice and is a creamy milky color, but when you hit it with a little dye and sand it off it reveals some nice burl and curl....


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## joasis (Sep 15, 2006)

So how did you aquire that one Steve?


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## Burlkraft (Oct 15, 2006)

joasis said:


> So how did you aquire that one Steve?


My guide and I were trudging through the jungles of Cambodia...I believe it was 1969.......Oh.....wrong story.......:laughing: :laughing: :laughing: 

I got this piece from Rocky at Penn State Hardwoods a couple of years ago at a turning symposium.


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## JP Sinclair (Nov 13, 2006)

Stay with the Cambodia story!, you could really run with that...

My big cherry burl is supposed to be coming, hopefully this weekend. 

If I cut it on my bandmill, how thick should I go with each piece?. I see some 12"X12" burl pieces on web pages cut pretty thin (3/16"). I had thought of cutting it in half with the chainsaw so I could screw the flat side down of a piece of plywood to be able to secure it with the clamps on the bed. I just don't want to go too thin and have it fall apart on me. I had thought of maybe 1/2" thick, that would leave enough meat for shrinking and final prep.


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## Burlkraft (Oct 15, 2006)

Wow that is thin...if any bendin' and warpin' take place I would think that would be junk....:huh: :huh: :huh: 

I'd stick with 1/2 or better.


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## JP Sinclair (Nov 13, 2006)

Gotcha. I might go about 3/4 to 1". I made all my hardwood floor blanks and furnature grade at 5/4. It maybe a little waste but it's nice to have plenty to work with. 

Pics to come....


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## joasis (Sep 15, 2006)

Come on Steve...finish the Cambodia story! It has to be better then some of the tails I hear!


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## Burlkraft (Oct 15, 2006)

Not much of a story. When I was a kid there's nuthin' I wanted to do more than to be a Marine and go to VietNam. Of course my mother intervened. Bless her heart...:shifty: :shifty: :shifty: 

It NEVER crossed my mind that I could die there. Stupid kid..:laughing: :laughing:


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## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

I can relate to that Steve. Right out of high school i was going to be a Navy Seal. Was not an "I'm going out for the teams" it was "I am going to be a Seal." This was way before they were "popular" in American society. A Seal introduced me to SCUBA in 1975 one day when me and a buddy were skipping school (long story). And the Navy recruiter said what I needed to hear "shorter stocky guys like you make better Seals than the big guys . . . . "
One of the few times I listened to my dad (a then already retired U.S. Navy Chief), he said "Son don't try out for the Seals you should go into the Coast Guard and save lives instead of taking them . . . or losing your own".
Well I listened to the old man and in hindsight I am sure glad I did. The timing would have been perfect for me to be one of the four Seals who drowned in the waters off Grenada, or who got shot to pieces in a firefight in Panama, or one of the occassional who die in hell week . 
I guess I will always have a soft spot for the Seals. I know i speak as if I would have made it through - but really no one has the right to feel that way unless they actually have earned it.
Go Seals.


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