Right now I'm hoping that a week from Saturday I might be able to get some.

Well, I was able to get up and pick up a scoop of those chunks. I have to say, this doesn't seem like a bad deal. The pieces all look solid, though I'm sure there will be a few to throw out. But I'd guess there will be at least 75 usable pieces, and it cost $35 (plus maybe 5 gallons of gas). I kinda lucked out, just ahead of me a fellow with a really large dump trailer had almost cleaned they guy out. Maybe that's what I got a fair amount of mud with my scoop. Oh, well..I can clean them off. Notice right there in front of the trailer is a chunk that really isn't a chunk, more like a 1/4 of a log. One of the pieces that get tossed I guess.

Edited December 28, 20241 yr by Fred W. Hargis Jr

1 hour ago, Fred W. Hargis Jr said:

Well, I was able to get up and pick up a scoop of those chunks. I have to say, this doesn't seem like a bad deal. The pieces all look solid, though I'm sure there will be a few to throw out. But I'd guess there will be at least 75 usable pieces, and it cost $35 (plus maybe 5 gallons of gas). I kinda lucked out, just ahead of me a fellow with a really large dump trailer had almost cleaned they guy out. Maybe that's what I got a fair amount of mud with my scoop. Oh, well..I can clean them off. Notice right there in front of the trailer is a chunk that really isn't a chunk, more like a 1/4 of a log. One of the pieces that get tossed I guess.

 

 

Some good looking stuff in there! I see end grain vases/bowls, some platters/shallow bowls and that one with the orange chalk looks like it could be a big salad bowl!  I wonder if that piece in the back, with the red grain, is a piece of box elder? Might get a couple of nice bowls from that "quarter log".

Looks good Fred. Looks like a great deal to me. Don’t toss any of it. That log piece will make a nice bowl. Any that are cracked you can cut into smaller pieces and make lidded boxes and other smaller things.

After zooming in on the picture I would love to get a couple of scoops. I need blanks for my Woodcraft classes.

Great looking blanks Fred.  The log piece may have some nice spalting color in it.  No doubt you got your money's worth.

Edited December 28, 20241 yr by HandyDan

Looks like a great find. Anxious to see what you do with it.  

Nice haul (no pun intended) Fred. A lot of possibilities with this assortment. Very fair price IMHO. Looking forward seeing what you create from these.

That is a nice haul. I sure wish there was a place like that close to me.

My last post on this. I got the chunks stacked and being a flat work guy understand board feet better than number of chunks. So I roughly measured the cubed area of the stack and divided it by 144. It's about 213 board feet of wood so on that basis it's really cheap. On the other hand it's also really green. The guy was selling it for firewood, but you have to wait at least a year to burn this stuff. I did cut into 3 different pieces, 2 of them were maple, the third unidentified. I tried turning 2 of them, my first effort with green wood. Amazing how those curls come off. I got several pieces that are are large enough to make a carving mallet, something that I've long wanted to try to make, but most of this will have to sit a while before i do anything with it. Anyway, here's my finished stack:

 

Now that you have turned green you may no be able to go back.

Fred if you are going to let it sit then you should seal the end grain. The best option to keep from losing any of it is to rough turn it, seal the inside and outside of the bowl and put on a shelf to dry. I have never lost a bowl to cracking using this method. This is my drying rack. There is a lot more on it now. For rough turning use the 10 percent rule. A 10” bowl should be left 1” thick.

 

Will sealing just the ends work on these cubes? I can see how it works on log sections and the bark sealing the long grain, but with the long grain open on these cubes I wondered about sealing them. I'll do that if it's effective for cut blocks.

I have a bunch that size I cut myself.  I sealed them some with glue and some dipped in hot wax. They all made it through. 

1 hour ago, Fred W. Hargis Jr said:

Will sealing just the ends work on these cubes? I can see how it works on log sections and the bark sealing the long grain, but with the long grain open on these cubes I wondered about sealing them. I'll do that if it's effective for cut blocks.

Yes all you need to seal is the end grain to slow down the drying process.