stabilization

My old casting and stabilizing cart (Old System) served me well at the big, open shop near Indy. But in my present location the shop was built in the late 1800’s, early 1900’s and mid 1900’s. As such, it doesn’t afford big open space to work a cart setup on all 4 sides. This week, while waiting...

Hello everyone, Wanted to see if someone could give me a "sanity check" on something. Got my new vacuum pot in the mail today and was going about setting it up. Like expected, has a small hole in the top for the vacuum line/gauge to go through into the pot. It came with 2 steel washers and 2...

I have been asked to make pens from a piece of white oak salvaged from a 150+ year old barn. The wood is very hard and very dry, not punky. I cut the piece of wood into 8 pen blanks, but as you can see in the attached picture, each piece has numerous checks and cracks that need to be stabilized...

I did my first real stabilization the other day. After about an hour when I came out to check the progress I noticed that the hose running to the tank had some of the oil from the pump backing up into the hose and some had actually gotten into the tank and mixed with the cactus juice. Any...

Just getting into stabilization. Made a vac system last night and immersed spalted maple blanks and pulled a vacuum until it stopped bubbling. Used Minwax wood hardener as it was at the big box store and I wanted to see what it would do. Didn't want to bake them as I figured that would be...

Hi every one. I am hoping that some members will be able to help me. For weeks I have been looking for stabilising blanks properly but I can't get anywhere. The focus it seems is Cactus Juice. However here in Scotland, we can't get it or we need to pay a huge amount to import it. I have...

Hi all, I recently came into some Manzanita burl and branches (freshly dug up/felled by a homeowner who graded the road into his property). I cut the burl into pen blanks and also cut some of the branches into blanks. Coated all of them with Anchor Seal about 2 weeks ago. I don't have a...

I have a contract to make wine stoppers from a 100+ year old Lindy tree (bass wood). I use CA finish on my pens but would be a challenge on wine stoppers. I know there are options such as Myslins 3-step, and other waxes or lacquers but I wanted to ensure a harder outer shell as the wood is so...

I am faced with a challenge (well it is a challenge for me :smile:). I am tasked with making a few pens out of specific pieces of wood from a family swing sit heirloom that has had to be dismantled...so this has extreme sentimental value and memories. The wood is REDWOOD is very soft. From...

Ok, I recently had another CA finish get a bunch of tiny cracks about 4 weeks or more after I got the perfect finish on it... This was yellowheart, not a wood you typically think of as difficult to finish. So now, I'm going to adopt a 100% stabilization policy. But are there any woods that...

OK, I'll try to take some pictures to show what I'm talking about, but my current camera doesn't exactly take Macro pictures very well. AAAnyway, I'm looking over my pens for sale this morning, and a quilted maple (?) sierra I did a few weeks ago now has spider webs cracks all over the...