Carving pilings

Hey all,

I am anxious to start trying my hand at carving and have a question. Has anyone done any carving using pilings. There is a small mountain of 3 - 5 foot piling pieces up the street from my house from a new condo complex they just built the foundation for.

I know about the toxicty of CCA and am prepared to deal with that. I am just curious if there is anything else that I need to know about, such as are they prone to splitting, how well to they stain, etc...

I'm thinking if there like telephone poles they will splinter. Don't quote me on this.

Here in south Florida, a LOT of the old pilings are a South American hardwood resistant to worms and Very hard, But very beautiful.
Take anold gouge with you to check some of them out. Just take some chunks out and look at the wood. You May find a beauty.

The wood is usually nice, but they are heck on equipment. If you carve in it, you'll get good at sharpening your saw/chisels!! :)

-Gman

I wish I had found a pile of pilings here. I wouldn't carve them, I would set them in the ground around the patio and along the sidewalk and then get some rope or chain and connect them. Always wanted to do that but buying that many pilings and rope is gonna be costly! Anything you can get free is great even if you have to just stack them now and figure out how to utilize them later. Good luck and have fun!