Years later I traveled to Hawaii, the big island. I snorkeled in Makaiwa bay, body surfed dangerous waves on a black sand beach near Hawi, at the end of the Akoni Pule highway, not far from the King Kamehameha statue that was lost, but now is found.
I drove as many of the roads as I could on the Big Island, on a quest to buy some koa. Tried every shop I saw in every town I drove through, but the answer was always the same - no koa (for haoles), although that last part was unstated.
That was in 1990, however, back in 1974 I obtained employment at a mainframe computer manufacturer in Sunnyvale. I worked with a great bunch of people, many of whom I have kept in touch with over the decades. One bought a bowl from me last July, we talked, and I asked about another guy who now lives on the Big Island (that story is awesome, but only so many words fit here). I told him I wanted some koa, and he knew a guy who might be able to obtain some. More communications, months pass, then yesterday the koa showed up.
MamaM asked about what prompted my purchase of that koa and this post is some of the back story. Those of you who have been paying attention know that I am cheap. Real cheap. I am willing to gas up my saw and drive a county or two away to saw some free wood, but the thought of paying for a chunk large enough to make a bowl hurts me. All the while I was negotiating with my koa benefactor he never once mentioned price. Well, even a cursory search for curly koa wood brings up prices that are painful. Fifty dollars a board foot is not unknown. But what do you know - dude sent me eight board feet free, gratis, didn't even ask to be reimbursed for shipping from Kurtistown. Is this a great country or what? Here is a picture of the kind of work my koa guy does:
So that is the story of how some beautiful koa arrived here in my snowy realm. It truly is a wonderful world.
The best ukuleles are made of koa.
14 comments:
If you want to cheat death, go over to Oahu and do the surf at Sunset Beach.
You can always tell when there's a competition. The woodies line up on one side of the road and the EMT vehicles line up on the other.
Am I right that you are going to make bowls out of the 2 pieces of koa that arrived a little bit ago? Also, and I forgot to ask you, you said it was treated on the ends. Treated with what?
Ed, I stopped on Oahu in '96, after an 8 hour flight from Sydney. Crossed the international date line and gained a day but didn't realize it. I hiked all over Honolulu on foot, including a hike around the rim of the caldera that is Diamond Head. It wasn't until I got home that I realized that for 10 cents, or whatever it was, I could have caught a bus to the North Shore and at least looked at the waves, which from the movies I have seen, are terrifying. Cheating death, if you are lucky!
AllenS - from what I can tell the guy used Anchorseal, which is a commercial product for sealing end grain. It's going to be put to the test - the wood is now indoors in a very low relative humidity environment, especially compared to the tropical environs it was in just days ago. I might bag it up, at least with paper bags. When I seal freshly cut blocks of wood I use paraffin which I melt in a double boiler.
Now you know what to use on the ends of the block of flame figured box elder that you spare from your stove and ship over here. ;^)
All of the really big box elder, I cut down quite a while ago. You wouldn't have wanted it. Most of the big ones were used as fence posts a long time ago, and contained hog netting and barbed wire inside of the trees. Not to mention fence staples and large nails. I've ruined more chains for my chainsaws that I'd care to admit to. I've had to take 55 gallon drums, remove both ends and then cut them into 3 pieces, which I then put around, or partially around the stumps and then burn them. When using a chainsaw and you starting seeing sparks flying, you know something is terribly wrong.
Sixty, my wife wants me to build her a Frank Lloyd Wright Origami Chair. For the life of me I can't figure out how the arms would join to the sides. Any suggestions? I know I could pay someone for plans, but you'd think the answer would be obvious. It's just plywood pieces, after all.
http://senaterace2012.com/wp-content/uploads/woodworking-frank-lloyd-wright-origami-chair-plans-pdf_289218.jpg
Wright Chair color photo:
http://www.tcmaker.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/OrigamiAntiTippingFeet.jpg
Driving through my West Nashville neighborhood yesterday, I spotted an Oak burl that was probably 2-1/2 feet in diameter. The tree was still healthy, so my friend who turns burl into bowls will have to wait for that one.
Having never heard of the koa I did some checking because your photo reminded me of walnut wood. It could almost be the Polynesian cousin to the black walnut tree. The internet pictures of the tree and even the leaves are similar to the walnut, but I'm guessing the koa wood has desirable visual qualities that walnut lacks that you would seek it out.
Allen, nowadays hardly anyone would use a tree as part of a fence but it used to be quite common in the days when everyone had livestock and fence posts weren't always available. I can still find the occasional old tree with embedded fencing.
SS - that is an excellent design - I wonder why I never encountered it before. I look at it and think that given enough dimensions I could make a pretty close copy after mocking it up in cardboard, then once the model looks the way I want, using those pieces as templates for the plywood. Looking at pictures of the FLW original I get the sense that he used some thick plywood, on the order of 1" or so. As always, when working with plywood, the issue becomes one of properly edging it. Even the best Baltic birch void-free ply will have cosmetic issues, but if the finish is paint, then putty would solve that issue.
Burls are totally cool - guy just posted a picture of an enormous one on FB - asked if I wanted to buy it. Buy? I responded like Maynard G. Krebs when work was mentioned.
I have found plenty of tramp metal in the logs I have sawed - that is one drawback of using free wood. One walnut log in particular I had to resharpen my saw after every cut. Every single cut. That was a long day on that site, I'm here to testify. There are 108 drivers on my big saw, full skip pattern means I have 36 teeth to sharpen. I took that day as a zen lesson in sharpening. Be here now. Look to the good. File, file, file, mutter, mutter, mutter.
And fences - I had to learn about those the hard way, too. That was a white oak stump in 2002. I was deathly ill and literally had to lie on the ground to sharpen the saw - my strength was gone, but I wanted that wood. Got it. Got better, too. And developed character. Yay!
AllenS: I didn't mean to make my comment sound like I know something about trees as fence posts that you don't. You surely know more about it than I do, as does Sixty. I was just spouting off for the benefit of anyone who might never have seen fencing or barbed wire in a tree stump.
Sixty, I had not seen the Origami chair either until my wife and I toured Taliesin West in Scottsdale last summer. She and I sat in one and it's very comfortable, unlike a lot of Wright's chair designs. I think it's made from 3/4" plywood. Apparently it does have a tendency to tip forward. I wish the blueprints available online weren't so blurred.
I'm just a wood hacker and I was thinking of doing a mock-up using big box store plywood, and if it turned out nice I'd just paint it. The story is that Wright gave his minions a sketch and to finish the design so it only used one sheet of 4x8 plywood.
I just don't think brads and glue will hold those chair arms in place the first time a butt leans on them.
The joinery necessary to make that chair strong enough to not collapse when sat upon would be tricky. I could think of a variety of methods, but I think that glue blocks screwed into the unseen portion of every joint would be a bare minimum. That design presents real challenges, and like Falling Water, FLW was more interested in the surface appearance than the structure that holds everything together.
So my recommendation is get some plywood, add plenty of glue, blocks, and screws. Tattoos optional. You can wing it on the actual dimensions - if you can get the angles close enough then your version will look fine. Also, maybe a counterweight on the back outrigger would be a good idea.
Thanks, Sixty. I was thinking glue, screws and lots of wood filler. Maybe I should get one of those pocket hole jigs for the screws. I usually just free hand my countersink bits. Somewhere in my readings I saw someone modify the design somewhat to help prevent tipping. Of course, any modification would require more than one sheet of plywood.
LOL, I've been glued and screwed but never tattooed.
Bringing clearly to mind what the meaning of IZ is!
The story, gift, and invitation present and presented definitely affirms wonder!
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