How to prepare large pieces of driftwood?

Can you fit it in your dishwasher?

I've washed wood like that before. The hot water may split part of the wood. Running 7-8 full cycles does not get rid of all the tannins but at least a good part of them are gone.

Just a reminder - do not use soap, hehe

--Nikolay

I have no answer to the question about the dishwasher making the wood sink. All my pieces of wood sunk from the very beginning, even before any washing.

I do believe that the dishwasher helps air and tannins to get out of the wood because of the hot water. But even after 8 cycles one of the pieces of wood produced some tannins for about 3 more months while in the tank.

To me it seems that there is no fast way around the tannins, unless one uses wood that is white.

I've never tried using bleach on the wood followed by a neutralization with chlorine remover. May be someone else would share their experience with that approach.

--Nikolay