gglass Posted September 21, 2012 Report Share Posted September 21, 2012 Howdy Everyone! I have been asked by my wife to make some twitches for some people that she works with. For those of you who are not as familiar with horse culture, a twitch is a wooden staff between 3ft and 6ft in length with a loop of rope or chain at one end. You loop the rope around an unruly horse's lip and twist it to put pressure on their lip which makes them behave. It may sound painful, but when a 1300 lb animal decides not to do what you want it to, sometimes you need this kind of tool purely as a safety measure. Anyway, I'm making a couple of these. I went into the woods and cut down some nice straight saplings. I don't know what kind of trees they were, but we have lots of oaks around here in N. Central Florida. I cut them to rough length, stripped the bark, and started sanding the wet wood. My question is, once I get done making it a functional twitch, what are your suggestions for finishing techniques? The wood is very green and wet. I was thinking about using some kind of tool, like a fork or something, and scoring up and down the whole thing and then burning it with a torch. I thought that might look neat. then I would slap on some poly or something. Would adding varnish to wood this green be a terrible idea? I'm not too worried about it warping since this is going to be a very rustic project, but I am worried about it splitting or otherwise cracking. Any and all input it greatly appreciated! If I need to, I'll go to the hardware store and buy some nice thick dowels and make a more traditional twitch, but I really dig the idea of a rustic one. Thanks for the help! -Greg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TRBaker Posted September 21, 2012 Report Share Posted September 21, 2012 Greg, I think you would be better off letting the pieces stick dry for a while before you do anything with them. If there is a time issue then just seal the ends so you can minimize splitting from the drying out process. I have never tried to put a finish on a piece of "so-green-it's-wet" wood but I can't imagine it would work any better than finishing a board soaked in water. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gglass Posted September 21, 2012 Author Report Share Posted September 21, 2012 There is a time issue, so I may need to resort to plan B. I'd hate to give this to them only to have the end split in a few weeks. I think it will be really hard to seal the end that has the ropes coming out. I'll give it a shot, but I'll make one out of dowel too just in case as a fall back. Thanks for the advice though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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