Bizarre Find

[blazeman45]

I cut a piece of 8/4 walnut today and in the middle of the board I find a small circular piece of metal. I have yet to figure out how it got inside the board. There is not an external hole in the board And it is very soft like aluminum. You can see where the cut was made and the fact it was "inside" the board! I'm still scratching my head!

 

[cyclopentadiene]

Most likely a bullet. I have seen these inside a log that someone turned into a bowl with the bullet exposed.

 

[cpw]

Most likely a bullet. I have seen these inside a log that someone turned into a bowl with the bullet exposed.

I concur. If you look at the growth rings you can see the damage and scarring toward the outer side of the tree then where it continued to grow over the damage. It must have been some time ago just judging by the number of additional growth rings in the upper left quadrant of the slab.

 

[TENdriver]

Steve, I wouldn’t consider it bizarre. Is it soft like a piece of lead...as in a bullet?

I’d consider myself fortunate if I hit that and none of my tooling or equipment was damaged. A few years ago I wasn’t so lucky when a brand new, large diameter router bit was damaged by a piece of metal that was many inches deep into some California redwood I was milling. I don’t often use that bit, but I now have to use a scraper to remove a ridge off of any architectural material I mill up with that bit.

 

[danmart77]

I have yet to figure out how it got inside the board. There is not an external hole in the board And it is very soft like aluminum. You can see where the cut was made and the fact it was "inside" the board! I'm still scratching my head!

If it isn't a bullet(lead or other soft material) it could very well be a fence nail or spike of some sort. I found a maple sugar tap in a board. I cut thru it and ruined my blade but it was at least 50 years inside an old tree. I went back and looked at the stump and it was an old tree. I am not a dendrochronologist but there was no entry hole to conclude it was a bullet and the looks of the discoloration suggested it had iron in it. A decent guess but still a guess.

When I find lead in the wood, I leave it and press on with the character. It won't hurt you edge tools and it look pretty cool.
All that and YOU had to pull out "dendrochronologist" seriously?:swoon:

 

[Bill Clemmons]

Here's a piece of Cherry I cut into a few years ago. I figured it was shotgun pellets.

​

 

[sawman101]

I've come across lead bullets several time while cutting a board. I was once given 2 4/4 cherry boards that were wide enough to make a student desk top. They were very old from an old shelf. When I had planed them to clean them up, I found half a .50 caliber mini-ball. It had entered the tree many years before leaving one to wonder when and why it was shot at the tree. I've found smaller caliber bullets also, but the .50 caliber mini-ball left me enjoying many possible scenarios that occurred around that old cherry tree.

 

[red]

I agree it's a bullet but still think its cool!

Red

 

[Gofor]

Being its soft, I would guess its probably a lead bullet. If so, and its to be a bowl, I would caution against putting food stuffs in it. Wouldn't think it would affect adults too much, but could be bad for a small child.

If the diameter is .22, .38. or .45 its most likely a lead round. From the pics I would guess a .38 cal.

Go

 

[cyclopentadiene]

Interesting thought. Lead is not magnetic so i assume based on the technology it would not trip the blade sensor. But...

has anyone ever cut a non ferrous metal on their sawstop?

i never thought about barbed wire fence but it would definately trip the brake and destroy a blade.

 

[ehpoole]

Interesting thought. Lead is not magnetic so i assume based on the technology it would not trip the blade sensor. But...

has anyone ever cut a non ferrous metal on their sawstop?

i never thought about barbed wire fence but it would definately trip the brake and destroy a blade.

The Sawstop does not sense magnetics but rather a change in the capacitance of the blade which will tend to affect the resonant frequency. Whether it would trip would depend upon how much capacitance it added provide the metal did not simultaneously electrically bridge both the table and blade at the same time, which would guarantee a trip.

 

[scsmith42]

Back in September we milled a very old elm log. Stuck in a crotch was a horse shoe from a draft horse.

Totally obliterated the blade....

We typically scan with a metal detector when we start milling but this was so deep in the log that it went undetected.

 

[Endless Pursuit]

When I was a teenaged high school football player, I wanted to do something during a summer to get into good shape form the coming season. My father suggested I go work with a friend of his at his sawmill as an "offbearer". In addition to learning what real WORK was and getting into tremendous condition, I also learned what happens when a railroad spike buried in a red oak log encounters a 72" circular saw with cam-lock insert teeth. Fortunately, nobody was seriously injured but a $2500 blade was wrecked and the tin roof over the saw required patching.

I'm glad you encountered a piece of soft metal. I run a Lumber Wizard metal detector across every board before it sees the Jointer or Planer heads. I'd love to find a bullet some day and make it a feature in whatever I was building. But I'm done with Rail Spikes as I'm sure Scott only wants to see a shoe on the horse or in his hand.

 

[sawman101]

An interesting find and story behind it. A hay knife from a scythe was found by a farmer when cutting a tree on his fence line. It was embedded in a crotch, and the ends were nearly rusted away. His father remembered hearing the story of how his grandfather was cutting hay when some other young men came down the road, heading to join up to fight in the War Between The States. He hung his scythe in the tree and ran to the house to get a few things and tell his ma and pa goodbye. A true story!