The stuff in Dennis' woods is American Beech. Quite a bit of it up here in the hardwood ridges. Plenty hard, but not the same as American Hornbeam (musclewood, blue beech).
Yes sir, I had to make a temporary tail stock base out of white oak I had laying around because the piece was a foot longer than my lathe could handle. It worked good!
I was referring to the clumps of it growing in clusters all over his woods, I'm pretty sure that stuff was blue beech, but I could be mistaken......
Your story makes me want to keep one of the ironwood sections in tact for future handle use instead of just cutting it to firewood length. I found a couple ironwood the other day that would be perfect for this. Debark it and there it in the corner of the shed for later use., And Mark it as what it is.
Ironwood will go punky but takes quite a while before that happens. Yet sometimes they will go punky while still standing.
Correction here. We have some beech (just young ones) but also have lots of blue beech. The blue beech grows mostly in wet places. I can show you lots the next time you come.
