[Eddy Smiles]

Yesterday I received a call from an associate at our martial arts school informing me that he had just finished with a board breaking contest and wanted to know if I wanted the wood. Not being one to be able to stand to see good wood thrown away I said yes and today I stopped by the school and picked up a very large cardboard boxed filled to the brim and then some.

Some of it was ordinary #2 Southern Pine, to hard, too sappy and mostly broken up too small to use. However, the remaining wood, very light and soft and in some decent sized pieces, looked too good to throw away.

I'd seen this kind of board used before at the dojo, in fact I'd wood burned on a couple of pieces, as it is commercial available coming precut in size 3/8" - 3/4" in thickness from a number of the Internet martial arts supply houses. I looked on the company's Internet site where it was purchased and they referred to the wood as "Empress Wood", Paulownia tomentosa. I'd never heard of it before but when I Goggled it I found that it is a common wood in the Far East, fast growing with multiple uses.

It really works well for wood burning as there is no overly hard grain. it's almost like drawing on paper. But I had never thought about carving it.

So after returning home from my workout I selected a dozen or more pieces of varying sizes and glued them together with Weldwood so that after trimming the broken edges I'll end up with three blocks approximately 2-1/2" x 2-1/2" x 9". I also selected three of the largest pieces to try some chip carving on.

If this gluing experiment works I have almost a never ending supply to glue up to sizes as large as 8"x8"x9".

My question is has anyone ever carved on this wood before and if so, are there any "jewels" of advice or pit falls that might be handy to know before I get started and waste a lot of time and energy.

[Thor]

Hi Eddie,

It was explained to me once, so this is second hand, and I can't confirm it, that the Empress of China tree is treasured in the orient for carving boxes. The reason is that it will remain water tight and be a safe keeping place for important things if carved correctly. They grow like weeds here, and their only setback as far as I'm concerned is the huge leaves that drop off in the fall and are so big they look like old newspaper littering up the place.
I have a piece put up to try carving took, but haven't tried it yet.

Let us know how it goes.

[Eddy Smiles]

Thor...

Doesn't look like this thread got too many takers! Ha! Ha! Anyway, I unclamped my glue job and sawed my mess down to the desired size. I ended up with 3 each 2-1/2 x 2/12 x 9 inch laminated pieces. Then I roughed out all three for some bears. It will be awhile before I get to them but so far I've noticed that I may have been a little too stingy with the Weldwood because I had some pieces that I cut out that weren't glued. Or it could be that the wood doesn't particularly liked to be glued. I guess that I'll find out more when I get to carving them. Will keep you posted.

[squbrigg]

All I can suggest Eddie, as I've had no experience with that wood, is try it. If it works, fine! If not, then find another use for it. It may make great practice wood if glued up in the right dimensions. Experiment.

Bob

[Blinky Bill]

G'day Eddy et al
Thought your tree rang a bell, so went agoogling as you do. Found the following, apparently although quick growing and of commercial use, Pawlonia gives rise to concerns about its rapid spread and is feared as a noxious weed.
John

Paulownia tomentosa (Thunb.) Steud.

Chinese empress tree
Family: Scrophulariaceae

A rapidly growing deciduous tree (c.10-20m tall) with a branched crown and large leaves (up to 40cm across). It produces clusters of trumpet-shaped cream to mauve flowers. The pods mature in autumn and point upwards before splitting along two seams and releasing millions of tiny wind-blown seeds (Anon. 1996). One tree can produce 20 million seeds per year (Anon. 1996). The seeds are short-lived, with no dormancy (Bond 1993). Mature plants can regenerate vigorously after coppicing or stump-cutting (Bond 1993). Growth can be very rapid in the first 20 years, after which it shows exceptionally slow growth (Borough 1991). For rapid growth to occur, the plant requires full sunlight, ample soil moisture and fertile soil (Boroughs 1991).
P. tomentosa is native to south-eastern China. It was introduced into the USA in 1834 and immediately escaped cultivation, becoming naturalised from Georgia to New York (Anon. 1996) . In China, it exists' as scattered individuals in disturbed forests (Borough 1991). There has been no research on the weed potential of Paulownia species (Bond 1993). The only information in Australia relates to ornamental use and forestry trials in south east Queensland and north Queensland. In forestry trials it performed badly and suffered heavily from insect attack (Bond 1993). Landcare members at Beechmont (Queensland) have expressed concern over the vegetative reproductive capacity of cuttings and the regenerative capacity of the cut stumps. Since it is a pioneer species, it may have some potential as an environmental weed in highly disturbed tropical habitats, such as the edges of rainforests, where sunlight, moisture and nutrients are in good supply.
PP tomentosa is currently being widely promoted in Australia for investment agroforestry. Although the wood is light and quite weak, it can be used to make bowls, utensils, plywood panels, furniture and musical instruments.

[Doug Ridley]

If I'm not mistaken Goody uses Pawlonia quite a bit for his Santas. He sent me a piece which I carved into a Santa and it carved pretty well. Not my favorite but not bad. A little too soft for my taste but still very workable.

[wade clark]

Doug's right. I think Goody grows his own...it grows incredibly fast, maybe 2 years to have carving wood big enough for Santas. He gave a blank to anyone that wanted to try it a couple Christmases back. Generous good man!

[Eddy Smiles]

I'm about half way into carving a standing bear out of the block of Empress wood that I glued together. As Doug said it's very soft, not as soft as blasa, but it does take a knife okay. The only thing that I've noticed is that you have to be real careful about how large a chip you try to cut out. It has a grain and will split out if you're not careful. But this is controllable by reducing the amount of wood cut at anyone time.