# Opened a wicked one . . .



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Started on this last night and made two cuts before I firgured it was too dark too continue. Finished it off this a.m. Many of my customers love this denim. I haven't liked it traditionally but it's growing on me. :yes:


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

I reckon. I was just thinking last night I wish someone would post some cool pics in the milling section ('cause I have not seen anything spectacular here on my mill lately)...well that qualifies as cool indeed :thumbup1:


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Thanks. Remember that topic a few of us had going on a while back about whether or not walnut would spalt in the heartwood to any degree? 

I'm fixing to throw a 6' section of a 16" dia. that I put beneath my ongoing sycamore pile. That conversation (when was that 1, or 2 years ago?) promted me to take one of my already 3ish year old walnuts and bury it beneath that sycamore concoction. 

I just bucked it at 6' (because my hydraulics are out and I will bust a nut with even a 6' one) and the sapwood is falling off literally. I can see spalt in there but nothing in the heartwood in the end grain. just green and wet as it can be. Can you believe how well walnut keeps?!?!

Anyway will try to post pics if anything unusual. Don't think it spalts. :no:


----------



## bradleywellsoff (Nov 27, 2008)

Thats wild! Will that color hold when it dries out?


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

TexasTimbers said:


> I just bucked it at 6' (because my hydraulics are out and I will bust a nut with even a 6' one)


:laughing: Is Mrs. TT out of town ?...Put that cant hook in her hands, she'll do the heavy work for you, all 100 lbs of her.

No I don't think walnut spalts. I have had some laying around for 2-3 years here that are short culls off a logging job 2-3 years before that (so they where felled 5-6) Sapwood is history, I opened one and the heartwood is just fine. They laid on the ground on that job but I did get them up off the ground here. I think bugs can get them, but I don't have bug problems here in the yard (knock on wood). Another thing too is up north we just don't have the "spalting time" you do, heck my logs are frozen solid 3-4 months of the year. I have had sycamore in the spalt pile for over a year and 1/2...they still are sprouting little limbs :huh: Stupid logs think they are still alive.


----------



## mdlbldrmatt135 (Dec 6, 2006)

Kevin,

you owe me a keyboard........ and that reminds me I need to get my ass up in the attic and check those door blanks you sent me!!!


----------



## Chad (May 10, 2009)

It grew on me just reading the post and looking at the pics.


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

I think the denim is cool personally. I am not a fan of denim pine...well 'cause it's _pine_. You sent me a piece with some denim (and curl and burl and...well just plain funky) With the blue stain, hey you have red-white-blue. That there is American as apple pie. It does look like kinda grey rough sawn and dry, but the color pops right back out when sanded/finished.


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

We cut a bunch of primo wood this evening, but this is the only picture I wanted to post. . . . the end of the day


----------



## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*Lucky Man!*

I see that you have 3 treasures, the lady, the walnut, and the Tape measure.:laughing::laughing: bill


----------



## frankp (Oct 29, 2007)

That wood is pine?! I thought it was a box elder or something since there seems to be a lot of pink in the examples of that I've seen here. That is too cool, I'd love to see what it's like when the blue comes out.


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

No Frank I muddied the discussion by mentioning pine because it gets the same blue stain and is sold at a premium as "denim pine". It is box elder like you thought.


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

woodnthings said:


> I see that you have 3 treasures, the lady, the walnut, and the Tape measure.:laughing::laughing: bill


Yep. Wouldn't take for my . . . . . tape measure. :laughing:

Actually that's just a regular old Stanley Powerlock. It's not the illusive PL II so I'd probably trade it before the other two.


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Here's that old, nasty, sap-rot walnut before and during the power wash . . . . . . .


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

And it did deliver some decent crotch figure . . . . 

Ignore the time stamp. These pictures were taken today. I need to reset the camera date.


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Finished it off just in time to beat the thunderstorm bearing down on us. No more milling today. :thumbdown:









:laughing:


----------



## jeffreythree (Jan 9, 2008)

It almost looks like someone poured creamer into the coffee, all swirly. Is walnut usually like that fresh sawn or is it from the spalting?


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Walnut heart will not really spalt. It's just a dream Daren & I have. He stays anchored in reality, but I continue to live in my dream world and so I go on pretending one day, I'll be able to crack the code on how to get walnut to spalt. :shifty:

Walnut doesn't always look like that either. What you're seeing is the wild growth patterns inherent in crotch wood. The rest of the log that I whacked off that section is going to be mostly straight grain. in other words, firewood according to me. :laughing:

Another thing about walnut, you can';t see it in that image, but the color of a freshly opened black walnut is GREEN. I don't know it's not showing in these images because I assure you the wood was light green. The sun quickly turns it brown, and over time, the vast color contrast you are seeing in it will lessen slightly. Not dramatically but a little. 

If left unprotected in the sun, the contrast would lessen a great deal, until planed again and refinished then you'd see the contrast again as with most woods, if not all that I have ever dealt with. 

You can take a 100 year old Bois d' Arc fence post and cut it open, and you'll see yellow. Not exactly as yellow as a live tree but yellow for sure. The bigger diameter the post though (as in a big corner post) the yellower the wood gets closer you get to the center. 

Wet sanded with a high gloss polished finish and that walnut will knock your eyes out.


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

BTW the storms just barely missed us but looks like Crossroads, Texas is gonna get whacked. :boat:


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

Nice. It's probably not even punky is it ? (and that spalted sap does not count dude, nice try) Funny you should mention Bois d' Arc...I got pictures on my phone today of the *biggest* one I have ever seen. It's a new phone and I have to send them to my email and all that jazz, I will post them if I get around to it later.


----------



## dirtclod (May 7, 2008)

That's some box elder. Not much of it around here. 

I don't think you'll get black walnut heartwood to spalt. But maybe if you buried it by the full moon while chanting the secret...

Maybe what you ought to shoot for in black walnut is a natural process that turns out something like this:








That shot is nearly color true and I didn't wet the wood to bring out the grain. This color is stable and shouldn't change over time. Maybe I ought to call it something catchy like: Red Black Walnut. :laughing: I would tell you how to do it but then I would have to...:w00t:


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

DC, I think I may about to be converting you and Daren. I'm getting ready to start another thread entitled "Spalted Walnut" . . . . . .


----------



## TexasTimbers (Oct 17, 2006)

Oh, I nearly forgot. It's real hard to see, I admit it's a stretch and all, but if you squint your eyes to almost closed and look for a long time, and hold your head j-u-s-t right, I think this log has an image of "you-know-who!"  Ebay here I come!


----------



## Daren (Oct 14, 2006)

TexasTimbers said:


> : Ebay here I come!


:detective: Come on man, I faked a better "Abe Lincoln grilled cheese" last week :laughing:


----------



## bradleywellsoff (Nov 27, 2008)

TT, Your pics are a good way to spread walnut fever!


----------

