Woodworker's Journal 2009-33-5, страница 46

Rich and Well Worth It

By Rob Johnstone with Tim Knight

Highly figured Black Walnut has long held the preeminent place in the pantheon of domestic hardwoods, which is just where it belongs.

One day many years ago, a regular customer — we'll call him "Harvey" to protect the guilty — came into my father's cabinet shop with a production woodworking job. A local bank needed about 60 blocks of black walnut machined to hold brass name plaques for its big muckety-mucks. As I understood the job, it required slicing up 10/4 walnut lumber into a fairly complex geometry, sanding them mirror smooth and then routing a recess for the brass plaque. A good quality sealer, followed by a clear coat (we sprayed nitrocellulous lacquer) would finish up the name plaques. We also needed to glue green felt to the bottoms of the blocks to protect the banker's desks — very classy! For such small pieces, they turned out to be ridiculously expensive, and I held out slim hope of landing the job as I called and gave Harvey our bid. To my surprise, the only question he had was: "How soon can you get them done?"

Times were lean, so my answer was, "Right away," and I proceeded to work straight through the weekend, in order to prevent Harvey from thinking over the price and possibly changing his mind.

I was lucky and the lumber that I ordered was revealed to be exceptionally beautiful as it came out of the planer. On occasion, black walnut can be a bit gray and lack figure — but this stock was richly colored with myriad reds and browns blended together in a curvaceous grain pattern. I could not have been more proud of the finished pieces as I handed them over to Harvey early in the next week. And he was frankly impressed, not a common reaction in the "just get it done" world of production woodworking.

To my surprise, the following morning as I got to work, Harvey was waiting for me and all the name blocks were in boxes by the front door. I felt my stomach go a little queasy.

"Is there a problem with the job," I asked?

"Not really a problem; the customer wants some additional finishing," he said, not making eye contact. 'They want them painted chocolate brown ..."

Black walnut trees grow in fertile soil. When forming, their nuts are encased in a sticky green husk. When the nuts are ripe, handling the husks will stain your fingers purple.

46 October 2009 Woodivorker's Journal