I ve talked with a few wood turners that specialize in live edge work and all seem to agree that the bark will come off at some point no matter what you do.
Clean up live edge wood.
It won t come loose later scraping away that layer creates a slippery smooth edge with more rounded features.
Work your way along the edge of the slab.
Begin by removing a 6 8 section of bark starting at an end.
Below we have a couple of links that.
In this video we will walk you through the process we went through in order to clean up the live edge on our reclaimed wood countertop for our rv bathroom.
Scrape the fibers off with a nylon or wire brush.
This sanding will reveal any checks that should be addressed prior to doing anything else.
If you work across it you may gouge the surface and leave marks.
The first thing to do is to begin sanding to a smooth touch using 120 grit paper.