Spalted/rotten

Cody Hofsommer

Cody Hofsommer

Joined
Dec 2, 2011
Messages
913
I was cutting some birtch fire wood today and found some awesome looking spalt, but some of its pretty soft. If I can dent it with my finger nail or dig at it with my nail, can K&G fix that with stabilizing? Or is it just to far gone. Anyone had experience with this?
 
I've had some spalted mostly rotten hackberry stabilized. It was light and spongy, very soft. It came back usable, but still kind of soft. I put it on some knives and it worked just fine, but I'd not want it on a high end piece. That said, I'd do it again if I had more.
 
I think a DIY like the Cactus Juice might be really nice for this. I know that from my (limited) experience with K&G, it seems that they try to strike the best balance between "block of plastic" and "real wood". It may be that "block of plastic" is exactly what you're going for here, which is a criticism I've heard about stuff like Cactus Juice, although I don't have any personal experience to back up my statement.
 
I have had very soft, almost rotten, spalted maple , buckeye burl, and sycamore stabilized by WSSI. It stabilized fine to use as handles.
 
Cody- I got a big slab of spalted maple from a guy several years ago that was on the verge of just being rotten. It was VERY soft/punky.

I had it professionally stabilized. The blocks came back almost all polymer. I will always use stabilized wood if it's an option, and have never bought into the whole, "You're turning it in plastic" bit.... But those blocks were turned into plastic.

Usable? Yes. Good quality material that I used? No. :(

Of course this was NOT the fault of the stabilizing process. It was my fault for sending them a sponge. ;)

Without pics, I can't say yours is that far gone though.... so you may still be good to go. :)
 
I just had some stabilized by Faron Moore who I may add did a really good job. It was some spalted maple that had some areas that were pretty soft. Before hand these areas you could take your nail and gouge out some of the wood if you wanted. They came back in good shape and look very usable. Have not gotten it on a knife yet but they dont seem any less attractive or usable then any other block Ive had stabilized.
 
If it is crumbly or overly porous toss it.
But if it is structurally sound, just soft, go for it.
Birch gets some cool colors when it spalts but can go from good to punky pretty quick.
I would block it up, seal the end grain and bring it indoors to dry.
Otherwise it can turn to mush over the winter.
 
Burl Source said:
If it is crumbly or overly porous toss it.
But if it is structurally sound, just soft, go for it.
Birch gets some cool colors when it spalts but can go from good to punky pretty quick.
I would block it up, seal the end grain and bring it indoors to dry.
Otherwise it can turn to mush over the winter.
Click to expand...

Thanks Mark, it does have some great color in it, and some of it is quite sound, the next color, right beside it, but on the other side of a black line, it might be to soft. Maybe in a year or so I'll have a knife to show you all with it.
 
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