So I decided to take the plunge and jump into the world of trying to stabilize wood at home. I have had a few burls laying around, and purchased a few dry and partially dry ones to mess around with.
- I got the 2 CFM vac pump from craigslist for $50 - you will have to put a 3/8NPT x barb fitting on this, it's not the typical pump's fitting
- I got the 8qt stainless stock pot at bed bath & beyond for $20, with 20% off coupon
- the valves and fittings were from home depot, about $15. (1x tee, 2x 1/4" barb nipple, 1x ball valve) look in plumbing and air compressor sections
- The vac lines and drain cock was from auto store, $6. Vac gages here are TOO MUCH $$!!
- the Vac gage was from Harbor freight and it came with fittings, $10 with coupon.
- the Polycarbonate lid was a free piece of drop from my work, but many local plastic supply store will sell their drop for CHEAP!
- and the seal is just drawer liner I got for $3 at the grocery store.
The one thing I would maybe do different is just buy a lid from slickvacseal.com for a 3 gallon - its $40 comes with fitting, gagse , and poly lid 12" x 12". You'll still have to provide lines and a seal, but overall it may only be another $20
to not tap and thread or make as many plumbing connections.
I bought two types of resin - Stick fast (32oz) and Cactus juice (1 gal). I tried the stick fast first with some orange alumilite dye. I bought some dye from turn tex and some from Ebay... there are may colors. I almost bought some of the type stick fast has at woodcraft, but haven't just yet.
I bought some disposable aluminum oven pans ($1 for 3 pack) of different shapes to contain the resin and wood and also bought some Ball mason jars ($9 for pack of 12) to put different left over colors of resin in so I don't waste the stuff; it isn't cheap! So this first pic kind of shows my setup:
This is some of the components I have for stabilizing. Resins, dyes, and shows the plumbing connections. I used a 1/4" tap after drilling 7/16" holes to put in the radiator drain cock (for a vent) and the Tee fitting for the vac lines. You can see how the connections are done pretty clearly here and in the next photo. I used silicone to seal the 1/4" NPT threads in the lid and tape one everything else.
So once I was done I watched Turn tex videos on how to stabilize and got to it! This one is not cooked off yet, but I hope to post some results once I get my first and second ones done. This is stick fast with orange, obviously. and I may try to add in black after I cook the orange. I also have a red elm root burl soaking in clear cactus juice right now as well. It took 2.5 hours to pull all the air out of that chunk ( 2"x2"x5"). I am able to pull nearly full vacuum (it pins the gage) at about 1000 ft (OKLA).
Hope this maybe helps a few who are thinking about playing with this.