Brasstown Woodturners Guild

Acer negundo is a variety of maple, commonly known as box elder or ash-leaf maple. Being a thirsty tree, it is often found in creek bottoms. It’s most noted feature of interest to woodturners is the red stain found in what is often referred to as ‘flame box elder.’ Research has found that the red… Continue reading Flame box elder

A neighbor gave me a massive oak burl, far bigger than anything I’ve ever worked with. So this is a learning experience for me. I started by cutting the burl protrusion off horizontally, about half of the height of this piece. I then cut that in two, slicing it down the middle on the longer… Continue reading Big oak burl: what to do?

Pete Kaup brought a bunch of “butternut” to our February meeting, and it was wood from the butternut tree, not the same-named butternut squash, toffee or Massachusetts ski resort. The butternut tree is also commonly called ‘white walnut,’ and it is a close relative of the black walnut. Both are mildly toxic to other plants,… Continue reading “Butternut”: is it a tree, a squash, a toffee or a ski resort?

This was the outline used by Robert Marshall, in presentation on this topic, Uses of Epoxy in Woodturning, on January 6, 2024. I plan to update this post with contributions from Jeff Bagley, who co-presented on this topic at that meeting.

That’s a mouthful, for sure. It identifies a 3-D geometric shape, formed of 12 pentagonal pyramids, each made up of 5 identical triangles. Thus, it has 60 (12 * 5) identical pieces. In this case, we’re talking about an assembly of sixty 3/4″ plywood pieces, whose dimensions and angles permit them to fit together to… Continue reading Pentakis Dodecahedron