Palm Tree ?

[David M]

Is it worth the time to use , how does it look , finnished ?
I am getting some from a friends beach trip and just wondering.

David

 

[workinforwood]

I can't say I personally care for it much. It is very splintery and if you get one in your finger you will really know it <DAMHIKT!>. It is usually a light brown color, not much in the way of grain, it's pretty darn straight and it will have little specks here and there that look like tiny grains of rice...kinda like oak does, but different. I forget what that is called, but that is where the tree stores its food. My review is blaw and owey. It does have really good strength for using as a cross beam, but it is not so good for a vertical beam as it has a low crush resistance..similar to Elm as far as how the fibers grow.

 

[keithkarl2007]

The dust is very toxic and when turning it wet the sap or mist coming off it is very corrosive on metal so cover up the bed of your lathe

 

[Penl8the]

The blank on this slimline is dark palm. So I am not sure if it is the same as any palm tree. It is splintery, but I did not find turning it any differently than other wood.

 

[workinforwood]

That pen looks great Branden. the segments make the palm become something and I really like the shape you gave it...heck, that is an inspirational slimline! The food spots or lines or grain differences whatever..they are definitely longer and bigger on the black palm..that's why it is called black palm. Still not that exciting to me, but dressing it up like that certainly starts to change my opinion.

 

[Kalai]

There are many different palms and most of them are no good because the fibers are to soft, some are hard all the way through the tree and some are hard only around the edge of the log, if you cut the palm tree down and you can stick your pocket knife in the end real easy then it will be no good to use, if there is a hard edge and there is enough to use for pen blanks then it will be worth getting, it will look real nice like the picture Branden posted (Great Job Branden). I hope this helps, aloha.

Chris "Kalai"