The first thing you'll want to do is to make certain all the pitch is out of the part of the trunk you decide to work with. Then after the pitch is clear I'd put a heavy coating of clear lacquer on this piece of tree trunk and let it dry thoroughly. Then, using an electric miter (chop) saw, cut your pieces for the coasters. The miter saw should have sufficient clamping to maintain the cuts as you want them. And if you use a saw blade with fine teeth the bark should remain in tact.
In fact, if you don't have a miter saw, send me the piece of tree trunk (no more than a 6 inch long piece please) and I'll cut the circles for you and send them back -- no charge. That was 3/8" you wanted, right? -- Merry Christmas Holland, Chillie & Bill >From Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," Nephew Fred admonishes Scrooge for >his lack of Christmas spirit: "`There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say,' returned the nephew. `Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round -- apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that -- as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!'" [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
