Homemade Kiln Question

[ihocky2]

My neighbor has several holly trees that he is going to be cutting down with some nice sized trunks, and other than a few hours of my time and my chainsaw, I get it all for free. I searched some info and it seems the general consensus is to get the wood into a kiln ASAP to prevent the blue fungus from growing. If I was cutting down my walnut trees or something, I would find someone local with a large kiln. But I am expecting to end up with enough lumber for a handfull of fretboards, and maybe a few neck blanks, not much more. So it is only a small amount of lumber. Normally something this small would go into the attic and air dry for a few years. But it sounds like that would result in fungus growth with the holly.

I was wondering if a small solar kiln will get hot enough to dry at a rate to prevent the fungus growth? I know with a kiln I need to have air flow, but still keep it limited to prevent drying too fast and case hardening. Any advice on how feasible this would be?

[Woodenspoke]

My neighbor has several holly trees that he is going to be cutting down with some nice sized trunks, and other than a few hours of my time and my chainsaw, I get it all for free. I searched some info and it seems the general consensus is to get the wood into a kiln ASAP to prevent the blue fungus from growing. If I was cutting down my walnut trees or something, I would find someone local with a large kiln. But I am expecting to end up with enough lumber for a handful of fretboards, and maybe a few neck blanks, not much more. So it is only a small amount of lumber. Normally something this small would go into the attic and air dry for a few years. But it sounds like that would result in fungus growth with the holly.

I was wondering if a small solar kiln will get hot enough to dry at a rate to prevent the fungus growth? I know with a kiln I need to have air flow, but still keep it limited to prevent drying too fast and case hardening. Any advice on how feasible this would be?

I have never heard of Blue fungus and just did a goggle search with no results to speak off? Anyway I hope your leaving him the branches, LOL

As the wood is pretty plain Jane and would most likely be a better candidate for paint. I would skip the building of a kiln and just give it space in your shop regardless of the fungus threat unless it eats the wood. let it sit for several years and dry on its own, I believe this makes a more stable product. Seal the end grain for best results using wax or a commercial sealer. Barring that thought look for a local lumber dealer who is willing to dry your wood in his kiln, may cost less than building a kiln for one load of lumber.

[ihocky2]

I know that people have trouble getting a blue stain with holly, and have seen it usually referred to as a fungus problem. I know some people even try to encourage it in certain species of pine to get a blue green color to it. It may not be a true fungus though.

My idea for a kiln was to get a few feet of rectangular metal ducting and close off the ends and put some plexi glass in the top to create the greenhouse effect. Drill some holes in the bottom and top to allow minimal air flow, just enough to allow moisture to slowly escape. I can actually get most of the material free since a friend is a tin knocker in the HVAC union. Behind my shop gets a good 12-15 hours of sun each day during the summer.

I can see if there is anyone local who has a smal mill or something that might let me through a few boards in with them though.

Luckily he will have a chipper on site and it is his sons job to feed the leaves and branches into that.

[SD83]

As the wood is pretty plain Jane and would most likely be a better candidate for paint.

If it would look like these I would never think about painting/staining them... I like darker woods, but a would that is nearly plain white would be really cool I think.

[WAK Guitars]

Yeah I think Holly can look pretty cool when used with other woods, like in a laminate neck or something, that way it really stands out. Cause it really is crazy how white it is.

As for the kiln, I dont know much about the subject but it sounds like it might be a cool thing to try, seeing as your getting just about everything for free.

[orgmorg]

Getting it sawn up and stacked and stickered right away is definitely the right thing to do.

Blue staining is indeed a problem on many white woods.

Make sure your stickers ( the sticks that separate the layers of the drying stack ) are dry, as well. Otherwise you will get staining where they contact the wood.

Sealing the ends with a wax solution like Anchorseal, or latex paint will help keep the ends from checking/splitting.

Best thing is to let it air dry for a while, outside, top covered, sides open, ends shaded.

Keep it up off the ground 8" or so, in a place with good airflow.

I use a couple methods for the secondary drying process, after it has shed the bulk of it's moisture. ( down to 18% moisture content )

One is to stack and sticker it inside, with a dehumidifier blowing through the stack. This works good for a small batch, in a room where you would be using a dehumidifier anyway.

The other is basically the same, except it happens in a 4'x8'x3' tall box which is also the outfeed table for my tablesaw, and a work surface. The sides have removable panels, so I can enclose it fully when the wood gets down to 12% moisture content.

I'm sure I have left some details out, but that's the basics of how I do it.

Edited June 25, 2009 by orgmorg

[ihocky2]

Since he has started some of the pruning work already, I grabbed a thicker branch yesterday and cut it so it was essentially a 4/4 board and put it out on the firewood rack in the sun to see what it would do, and within 20 hours I am seeing the blue staining appear already. So it looks like if I am going to get anything usable out of this I am going to have to try it in some kind of solar kiln. Like WAK said, I am getting pretty much everything for free, so I think I'll give it a try. The worst that happen is I get some stained holly, but it might looke pretty cool with the staining, or at least be usable for pen turning.

I will say this much for it, the stuff is pretty darned hard. Even green I would say it is harder than the dry ash pieces I've got.

[j. pierce]

from an old Fine Woodworking magazine - I believe the article is free :

http://www.taunton.com/finewoodworking/Mat...DF.aspx?id=2002

Also:

http://www.taunton.com/finewoodworking/Ski...e.aspx?id=29500

I haven't actually browsed through that article or watched the video in a while, so they may not be helpful. There was a recent article (couple of issues ago?) about drying lumber in FWW, but I don't think it mentioned solar kilns.

And this was in a recent FWW Q&A. It was a temporary kiln, to be heated to 170 for 24 hrs, to help with pine that's still seeping pitch. Perhaps using something like this for the intial drying of the holly would help kill whatever's causing the staining? I can copy the rest of the info if you want.

I don't know much about this sort of stuff, not having had the space to deal with storing much lumber. Just throwing things out there that I had seen, however.

[Exoticwood]

I had some Holly sawn for me and stickered in a pile of multiple other species. This was protected from the weather but still open to the atmosphere and it did blue stain. The problem with blue stain is it goes through the thickness of the wood and it isn't really blue,

it's an ugly gray color. That being said, you can stain it black and it makes a great ebony substitute. I've read a few articles in FWW that suggest Holly as a great substitute for ebony because it takes black dye so well and it has almost no pores that you can see. I guess that's what makes it a great ebony substitute. On another note some of that other species was Pear and if I can ever get motivated I want to build a PRS McCarty copy with it.

I had a bad case of TAS and WAS and now I can't walk into my shop to work!

[westhemann]

Would you be able to bleach back out the staining?

[Exoticwood]

I tried dousing the wood with Chlorox and the surface looked a little better but I think that trying a dedicated wood bleach (which i understand is not chlorine based) might work better. I can say that as far as approaching bleach white Chlorox did not work. Not to hijack this thread, the Pear I have is far whiter than I have seen in Maple or the Holly I have. This is air dried Pear not the European steamed Pear that we usually see on the market here. Steamed Pear is steamed specifically to bring out the pink in the wood. I have a good amount of 5/4 Pear in the rough but only 1 piece of it in 8/4. That piece has a good twist in it ~ do you think in your experience that after flattening it will want to twist again? I was really hoping to use it as neck wood.

[westhemann]

Chlorox?Why would you use that?

[ihocky2]

Great, I have a pear tree out the inlaws farm that will be coming down sometime in the next 12 months, and now I have to figure out a place to store that for drying.

I do think the sheetmetal kiln has merit, but I am just trying to decide if I should paint it or not. I know that galvanized sheet metal gets plenty hot in the sun, I am just debating if painting it black would help it get any hotter or stay hotter.