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I cut down a 5" lilac bush yesterday & it has that purplish vein in it.
I have cut some before & dried in a 1" thickness let it air dry for a year & then processed it.
Some of the stuff I have now should be big enough for a soprano uke & definitely rosettes.
However this time I am considering cutting it a little thicker ~.150 while it is green & trying to dry it quicker??
I heard somewhere about putting it in the vac bag.
Suggestions welcome especially from those who have cut & dried small bits like this.

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Mike McNerney

This might help, not spruce but the idea should be the same.



This does mean you will post pictures here right?

Didn't harvest it, but processed a plum branch that had been sitting in an open area for a year or two recently.
Cut into 3+ mm slices, stickered in the workshop (RH 40-55) for 2 months, then thicknessed to 2mm, left for another month before making into a radial rosette.
No sign of any movement.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

If you heat it, do not apply wax first. If you want to seal the ends, try something else--maybe latex paint.

I just used TB to seal the ends

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

Lilac often grows with a lot of twist, so it's likely to twist a fair amount as it dries. If the wood has an 'S' twist, it will 'Z' twist on drying. If you cut it too close to dimension green there won't be enough left to dress out the twist.

DON'T try to speed the drying! This small stuff will dry fairly quickly anyway, and you're asking for trouble to speed it up. The twist issues are caused by built in stress, which is present in all wood, and you have to give it time to equalize or the concentration will cause checking. Cut it to a size that minimizes the amount of grain curvature visible on the end grain (at least quarter the sticks), and try to get the evaporation equalized on all surfaces by removing the bark and painting the end grain (TB should work, although I've never tried it).

The few times I've tried lilac the purple color faded out as it dried. Those were smaller pieces, though. If you can get some to preserve the color iit would make nice inlay. The only instrument use I've heard of for it is in flutes.

I have cut and collected a lot of local wood for turning projects over the past 25 years. Most too small for musical instruments. But the best local wood around here is soft maple which works well for instruments. It is common and big pieces are everywhere. I have turned many large bowls from it but have not cut into thin slices. Maybe some day.

4 red tip photiniena(?) logs, 5' each, were given to me by a friend from a 30 yr old hedge he cut down. 6-8" in di. The wood was white and very dense/heavy, not much grain pattern. That was the most interesting/novel wood I have worked with.

Many turners drop their bowls into alcohol to speed drying. They say it cuts drying time in half.