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Interesting (to me anyway) that nature doesn't seem to favour right angled structures. Hexagons are good, and Fibonacci spirals, but perhaps square forms are more difficult to grow or less adaptable to changing environments. Once you have a nice stable, flat environment square boxes work just...

Very impressive level of organisation, Morag - good to have everything covered against the dust (though I can't see any!)

My son in law's father (in America) is very much into getting the right gear. He bought himself a 'shop coat' (short, black, heavy cotton, made in America) from a fancy 'hand tool working' shop, Lost Art Press. It cost him over $170 but when it arrived he didn't like the fit and instead of...

Well this has gone a long way since I last looked! I think it is important to remember that in face to face conversation polite or courteous people will adjust the way they speak to move closer to the speech of others. This can involve non verbal aspects of communication such as use of hand...

I expect we will be seeing some pierced bowls in the near future!

The trouble is that there just isn't a fixed set of rules for what is 'correct'. Language is a living, evolving thing and the 'same' language (e.g. English) is used in a host of subtly different ways by different groups. Some of these groups are more inclined than others to insist that what they...

Hi Duncan, today I decided to keep a full depth bowl so I cored out some heartwood from the face in the traditional way. This was quite doable with a bog-standard parting tool and, as I can't turn anything much bigger on my little Jet lathe, I can't see myself investing in beefier gear for a...

I have just had another go. A very wet piece of elm (from a tree cut down just 5 days ago). 5" felt too deep for an 8 1/2" bowl so I cut off 2" but at an angle. Just using regular parting tool and it did get a bit grabby again but I got in far enough to be able to knock the pieces apart with a...

Hi M, yes but no but ... I was wanting to keep the full diameter of the blank by taking an angled slice out of it. I have tried to draw what I mean. By cutting in along B-C I should be able to take a full diameter piece out and make a slightly deeper bowl than if I just cut straight in A-A...

Thanks John. That tool is a bit of a beast! I would have assumed one would flip the blank round first, after making a big tenon on it. Then you could come in with the tool as with the coring systems. I guess it makes sense to keep the inside on the faceplate so you can put a tenon on it but I...

Hi Pete, I found this video of cutting four 2" platter blanks from an 18" diameter 9" deep blank using the McNaughton Centre Saver but here these are cut straight in rather than angled towards the drive, making 2" cylinders rather than more conical pieces...

I really like Robin Wood's work on the pole lathe and those hook tools look fierce but again this is cutting concentric bowls from the face. Something I may have a go at in future but I thought angled 'slices' off a deep bowl blank might be simpler to begin with!

But this produces a set of concentric bowls. What I am after is a way to take equal diameter slices off a blank but with a more conical rather than flat, cylindrical, face.

I have a few big bowl blanks from the trunk of an elm tree which had to be felled after succumbing to Dutch Elm disease. These are from half logs and some will be turned into 10" bowls which will be nearly 5" deep - a good size for a salad bowl- but I will use some to make two 10" bowls, one...

As ever, this is amazing work, Adam. I am always deeply impressed by anyone who is able to carve cleanly in wood, where grain always tries to mess things up! I was given David Esterly's 'The lost carving' for Christmas, about his work on the restoration of carvings by Grinling Gibbons at Hampton...

Apologies if this is common knowledge but artificial corks from wine bottles work really well for unclogging sanding disks and belts!

Wilson's paints here in Exmouth used to give these away with tins of paint. Good marketing, I think, as they were embellished with Wilson's name

I have long been impressed by the way the internet has allowed knowledge to be shared much more easily than in the past. It is wonderful that people take the time to show others solutions to shared problems - who needs a Haynes manual when googling a problem nearly always leads to a video...

I was given David Esterly's 'The Lost Carving' for Christmas and I am thoroughly enjoying it. Esterly was an american woodcarver who developed a fascination for the work of Grinling Gibbons and helped with the restoration of Gibbons' carvings that were damaged in the fire at Hampton Court...

I remember seeing a kit for planing chopsticks. I think it cost over £200!