Where to cut wood from a log for blanks

[asabai]

I am getting some practice with my woodworking skills before I move on to building a gun. I am wondering where the best blanks can be cut from on a tree, not the species, I will use black walnut and black cherry. I am planning on using some of my own wood (in log form now) to practice on for knife handles, maybe tomahawks, and then perhaps a pistol after I get more confident. Here is an odd piece of cherry from my pile.

 

[Coot]

The two makers I know both look for blanks cut from the bottom six feet or so of the trunk, The trunk of most trees is a good bit larger at the ground than a couple of feet up and what they are after is that curve. If cut from the base of the tree, using the lowest portion for the butt, the grain of the wood would be straight at the barrel and then curve thru the wrist to give maximum strength where the stock is thinnest. Wish I had a picture to post.

 

[paulvallandigham]

The most critical area of a gunstock, or grips for handguns, is the wrist of the stock, where you want the grain of the wood to run parallel to the line of the wrist. That give the wrist the most strength. You want to reserve the most ornate grain abd burl for the body of the buttstock so that you can show it off in the finished stock. The forestock needs to have straight grain running the length of the stock, if it is going to pretty thin. Half stocks let you use more wood, so you can cheat on the grain direction.

If you have a good piece of wood, but it just doesn't line up for the stock you want to make out of it, think about cutting the blank in half, planing both sides, and then flipping the pieces over so that the two center sides face outward, making a mirror image for the stock's grain. You can laminate the wood, giving the wrist that strength it needs, by sandwiching a thin layer of some other wood, or wood from another part of the same tree, and gluing them all together and pressing them under several hundreds of pounds of weight. With the lamination, you get two things you may not get from that pretty grain pattern. First, any stresses in the wood will expand in opposite directions, cancelling each other out, and making the wood far more stable than a stock cut from a tree in one piece. Second, you get to make your stocks without waiting for years for the wood to air dry. The stability of the stock will prevent the stock from warping, or moving in any direction, and that thin piece of wood sandwiched in the middle makes a good centerline for all the work you will do inletting the barrel, action, and other parts. It also gives strength to the stock where the action mortise is cut, making it much less likely to split, or crack over the life of the gun. Finally, with that pretty wood facing out on both sides of the stock, you can go nuts in how you adorn the wood to highlight that wonderful grain.

As for the rest of the stump, I see some nice knife handles there, and a few nice pistol or revolver grips. Maybe even a few pens( if you contact[url] Woodcraft.com[/url], for how to make them, and to buy the kits of parts to install.) The latter depends on if you have access to a turning wood lathe. That gorgeous stump wood would make some very expensive wood bowls, and vases.

 

[asabai]

This is a pretty small piece of cherry, about 6 inches wide (should have put something fro refrence in the photo) that I am only going to get some knife blanks out of. Some worms and or carpenter ants got too much of it. I asked my dad to get me some twigs from the black cherry for flavoring my steaks, but he gave me a large box of good size branches. I thought I would make him a knife or two out of the old tree from our yard of our old house. My parents moved from the house I grew up in five years ago so the wood has some sentimental value, and as dry as it will get. I'm glad I didn’t smoke some beef with it. The tree was two and half feet thick, but only had a few inches of wood under the bark.
The city I live in has a lot of black walnut trees and after a good storm a few go down. The next time we get a good wind storm, I’ll be asking if anyone needs help removing their downed trees if I can take a few select cuts home for future gun stocks. I’ll dry those for a few years then see what’s under the bark. With everyone’s help I’ll be able to find those “select cuts”.

 

[rmonday2]

:hmm: I could be mistaken, but I think you should remove the bark from the log and/or slabs for drying the wood. This would prevent any worms or ants from keeping residence and destroying your limber. Just a thought,

Ronnie...

 

[paulvallandigham]

Have to agree with Ronnie. Remove that bark. Slab the wood into 3-4 inch slabs, for drying. Then seal the end grain with wax, or varnish. or shellac. If the wood dries too fast, it will develope checks and splits.