Question about Sweet Gum

[mtngoat]

Has anyone here tried to carve sweet gum?

My family has about 30 acres with some downed sweetgum, and I was wondering if it would be anygoood for carving.

thanks

goat

[fpace]

You have to carve it while it is green. If it is dry you can't carve it with dynomite. Carves nice though when green. Make sure you take the bark off down to where the wood is white... if you leave the yellowish brown "skin" on just under the bark it will turn brown. After carving put a sealer like pentacryl on it to keep it from cracking when it dries. They make good walking sticks. Hope this helps...

Carve on..

[Eddy-Smiles]

Fred summed it up real nicely. In my experience I've found that if you're making walking sticks 1-1/2 to 2" in diameter and you cut them way too long and strip both ends backs 6-8" they will dry out without splitting. What I like about Sweetgum is that once dry the bark really adheres to the stick so that you can carve a woodspirit or what ever you want and leave the entire stick or any part of the stick with bark surrounding your carving. With a couple of coats of urethane or varnish on the stick it really looks pretty.

[Mitchell]

There are some threads about sweetgum listed below ("similar threads").

It carves wonderfully when wet......as do many woods. It will check/split and you can wrap the carved area (walking sticks) so that it dries slow enough that it doesn't check too severely. I use "Pentacryl" to keep it from splitting - as Fred suggested, but it's hard to find and a bit expensive.