Willow plug

[Shreckmeister]

I have a nice block of Willow with tight grain.  Has anyone ever tried turning/carving Willow?
I don't want to waste it if it won't turn/carve nicely for a plug.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

I've never turned it, but willow is apparently what prosthetic arms and legs were originally made from. 

[Dennis Glazener]

I have turned lots of willow. In our high school Ind. Arts class we had a good supply of willow. I have made bowls out of it with no problems. The best thing we did with it was to make base ball bats out of it! Light but they felt good hitting both softball and base balls with them. We were told that you could not use willow bats in professional baseball, supposedly they flexed more and gave extra distance to a ball hit with a willow bat. May have been malarkey but we made a bunch of bats out of willow, everybody wanted one!

I never thought the wood was very pretty, just plain straight grain. Other than the appeal for bats the only thing it had going for it was the low price compared to the other wood we had in the shop. If I remember correctly we paid about .40 a board foot for it.

Dennis

[Habu]

It turns OK, tends to "fuzz" a lot at times--try to finish your turning straight from the tool and burnish with shavings rather than using sandpaper.  It carves OK, not really a "hard" hardwood.  Pin it with wood and glue the pins; nails tend to work loose when side-loaded. 

[Shreckmeister]

Thanks for the feedback.  I think I'm ditching the idea and going with maple.

[rich pierce]

Willow is hard to split for such a soft wood.  That could be a plus.

[Tim Crosby]

Thanks for the feedback.  I think I'm ditching the idea and going with maple.

 I would at least try it, at least you will know for yourself with only 30 minutes or so of work time invested. I have turned Willow before and not had any problems with it. Raise the grain, sand it on the lathe down to 320 and then polish it With 0000 steel wool.

  Tim C.