Alexander (King) Palm trunk questions

Local council has a free green waste kirb side collection here in Brisbane & there are a lot of residents cutting down palms.

I scored some Alexanda & Cocos palm logs, freshly cut 2 days ago.

Already there are splits occurring in the centre of each piece I snavelled.
What's the g - o ?

Is it still possible to carve this stuff or will it fall appart?

I was intending on going for another scavenge tomorrow keeping clear of these 2 species.

Whaddayareckon?

Pics attached:

Hey Gib Gib do you know that guy from TikiBeat that lives out in Ipswich?

Hi Cheeky,
Did you enjoy your trip out here?

I'm not a very tikified person & usually only drop in here when I know I have time to carve & need ideas.

Ipswich is only a short drive from here.
Tell me more :)

Yeah had a great time.
I found out about him from a guy in Sydney, so I went over to see him whilst we were in Brisbane.
I've got his card somewhere I'll dig it out for you.

Looks kinda rotten in the middle to me......

gibgib, the fiber isn't tight enough on those types of palm trees. Not good for carving.
In Calif., we use Mexican Fan palms, California Fan palms and Canary Island palms, to name a few.

Palm trees are basically just really tall grass, & some just don't have the density to take carving. I guess the Alexander is one of the "not dense enough" ones, but I thought that the Cocos Palm would be?

Maybe you could take the splitting wood, split it vertically into quarters, cut the split portions off the back & carve masks into/through the good wood?

The middle ofmthose and queen palms just need to be taken out . There is only about 2" usable meat on then outside and if you don't get the core out before it dries then the whole thing turns to rot. Theres a guy here that carves Queen and King. Ge gets'em fresh and just reaches in with his hands and yanks out the center and uses his chainsaw and a Pole saw to reach the taller ones. Then he smoothes it out with his grinder.

G'day all,

Further to this initial post, the remaining palm logs appear to be OK thus far.

I have slow down the drying out process & it seems to be working.

I've place all tiki-to-be palm on a tarp under the house. The tarp is sitting on concrete in a dry spot.

When the time comes to chisel, I only need cut the ends off each piece to find good wood.

In recent days I have scored much golden cane trunk in pieces half metre each. Once I'm done with the current phase of renovations on the house I'll have a hack again :)

Cheers

Hi Gib Gib - I was just havin a browse through and noticed my name come up in your site earlier this year - can I give you any help with your tikis - I actually live in Greenbank - happy to have you drop over anytime - drop me a line

Hi Marcus,

I'm at Annerley so not far from you!
Thanks for responding to this message as it sent me a notification & got me back here after a long break :)

Haven't been carving much due to a car project on the go. I hope to get back into it before Christmas.

I like your work!
Did some searching & found a few images that still work from your previous postings.

Just added my most recent in this thread:
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=11508&forum=7&start=last&

How many tiki people in SE QLD do you reckon?

hey gibgib,

its the brisbane crew! i'm pretty new here to TC but have found some amazing information and inspration already. Marcus is a great help and one of the best carvers i've ever seen.

i too have been inspired to try and carve a tiki of my own and will post some pics in a thread soon. i may also need you local guys advice as to what species some of the logs i've picked up recently actually are!!? i think some of the palm logs i've got are even more fibrous, moist and stringy than yours above, so i'm leaving those at the moment..

cheers,
harro.

Gday fellas! Its good to see some more Aussies hangin around to keep these Northern Hemisphereans honest!

What about Cocos Palms? I always see them in the "freebies" section in the classifieds, remove free. Technically I beleive they are a noxious weed that cant be planted. I want to rock up with a chainsaw and cut the buggers down and watch the people freak out! "Hey, they're easier to transport this way. Just glue em back together at home..." hehe

Hey gib gib (and you other aussies -I believe we are multiplying!) The cocos palm is the closest to a coconut palm that we have in Australia - I have carved both (prefer coconut but there are really hard to come by) With the cocos palm I go deep then let it dry up for a couple of days (usually get help from ants who enjoy the moisture) then I give it a sand and it comes up like wood then seal in a marine lacquer. The moisture is then sealed in - allows palm to dry through the ends, which enables it to become lighter and you dont lose any shape. (some palms when they dry up will shrivelup and concave in - the worst is the alexander palm - so dont bother with them they are crap. Oh grasshopper - hope this is enough wisdom for one day - wax on wax off - cya soon.

hey guys,
here's where my botanical expertise begins and ends:

it's a tree until it's chopped down, then it's a log...

unfortunately that's not too far from the extent of my knowledge, so can i rack your brains quickly. following on from marcus's helpful info... i picked up these 3 palm stumps one day, thinking it would be a good start to carving, but now i don't think they're carvable at all:

some of the "bark" just came away in my hands, and when i dove a chisel into it, it was really moist, stringy and fibrous on the inside:

so i've left these to dry out on their ends in the carport,(they're probably useless) and got myself some decent logs to start on from a local tree lopper. theres a mixture of wood types but i don't have a decent pic of them except as i loaded them outta the back of the trusty Val:

i'll take some other pics of them as i'm not sure what species they are, i've started on my first tiki, hopefuly it will be ata stage to post pics soon...

thanks!!

Cool harro, can't wait to see your work :)

The palms in the top pic are Majestic Palms. Don't discount them yet!
The easter island tiki I did was with a Cocos palm log which started splitting from the centre a few days after I nicked it from someone's green waste collection. It was actually very nice to carve, but only after it had dried out for a few weeks.
Where in Brissy are you?
Note also November in your diary for green waste council pickup on the north side around the Northgate area.

On 2005-09-29 06:03, harro wrote:

i'll take some other pics of them as i'm not sure what species they are, i've started on my first tiki, hopefuly it will be ata stage to post pics soon...

thanks!!

The ones in your boot look like a good score.

yeah gibgib, the majestic palms can just sit where they are at the moment, as i have plenty of carving ahead of me with those logs that filled up the boot there... those were from a tree loppers rubbish pile in northgate actually. i'm from holland park though - barely a stone's throw from annerley!! unfortunately i don't get much time to get out in the yard and hack away, so i've not made any progress on the first tiki recently... will try to get back at it soon though! cheers for the botanical advice too.

Harro man, that looks like a 2 door Val? Looks pretty tidy