new bowl - wife's Birthday present :) - comments?

[miles_hot]

I was meant to be giving my wife either an fish tank cupboard or a raised bed for her Birthday - very romantic me! - but both these projects have not so much slipped and jumped off a cliff. To be able to give something near her Birthday I dug under the bed and pulled out a bit of Ancient Kauri which I have been keeping for a special occasion. For those new to this wood it is from New Zealand and is a bog wood - samples which have been carbon dated are at least 50,000 years old - so older than humanity It can present some stunning grain and is recommended to be finished with at least 1200 grit but I only go up to 1000.

Anyway here's the WIP and I would appreciate comments on the finished article.

Using the band-saw I got it into a very rough round and stuck the screw chuck into it and got it into round with the roughing gouge. Then attached a oak flooring off cut with super glue gel and held it on over lunch with the tail stock. I started turning and suffered horrendous tear out, even with very freshly sharpened and honed gouge or scraper or skew etc!.

I jumped on the net and found very little about actually turning the stuff but there was passing reference to cutting as fast as you could, so swallowing a brave pill I took the speed up to 8 and then finally all the way up to max (11 )

It's a good job the wood is very well tempered as the tools was too hot to touch within about 0.5 - 1 inch of the tip.
Any how I finished the outer shape and then shaped the spigot for a compression hold in the chuck

I then shaped and finished the inner shape (sorry no pictures) and tried to work out how to get the glue block off as I'd been far to precise and got it to just the right thickness to fit in the chuck rather than leaving the bowl sticking out so that it could be parted off.
Having previously failed to be able to use the Sorby ali revering jaws with the VersaChuck as the Sorby jaws have a right which fouled the ridge on the VersaChuck jaws I drove over to Tool Post to see what I was doing wrong. Turns out I should have looked in the chuck box as there's a set of jaw mounts which have a matching groove in them.
Got home and sorted it out and worked exactly as advertised Thanks Peter. The only fly in the ointment was that there were no instructions on how to mount the rubber blocks onto the Ali jaws and I split the first one by tightening it too far. The second picture is how it should look!

Then thought about the pressure of doing my very first bowl reverse on my Wife's present and thought better of it. Found an old bowl that I'd abandoned as I wasn't brave enough to attempt a jam chuck and I couldn't get the Sorby jaws to work - nice little number in Sycamore. Mounted it on the lathe and turned the base off.

Buoyed by this success I moved on to the main act and turned the spigot off.

And so the finished article, even better it's pretty much as I initially imagined it.

There are some lines in the finish (the new Chestnut hard wax) but I think that's down to my use of the finish - maybe I attempted to remove the excess to late? as there were no visible marks (certainly not on the outside where I mainly used a friction rotating thing). I am investigating buffing it to a) give more shine and b) remove some of the lines in the finish. I'll update if this comes off and makes any difference.

Interested in your thoughts.

Miles

 

[Paul.J]

MilesHot wrote

and got it into round with the roughing gouge.

:?: :?: :?:
That looks like end grain tear out.Was you using the Spindle roughing gouge :?: your not supposed to :shock:
Try using your bowl gouge with a shear cut next time,you will get a lot better finish.
Looks to be well finished in the end though Miles,and a nice piece of old timber.
Hope it's well excepted.

 

[Ad de Crom]

Well, that was quite a battle.
What count is the endresult, and it all came out pretty well.
Enjoyed the step by step WIP pictures, specially to find out that you did needed a higher speed to tackle the smoothing of the surface.
The endresult, a lovely birthday present for your wife. Shows off well on the table. The color of the old wood is gorgeous.
Happy birthday to your wife, she will appreciate it.
Ad

 

[richburrow]

Good work, I hope she is pleased.
When I screw in those rubber button jaw, I set the cordless drill clutch to 2. This puts them all in the same and it is far enough in.

 

[big soft moose]

looking good mate - i reckon we can strike the turning lesson off the to do list as its apparent that theres little i could teach you.

that said how long til the big day - is there no way you can get the beds done in time as well .... i ask because i know i would be playing with fire if i said to sarah " I know i promised you this that and the other, but actually i havent got round to it, here's a nice bowl instead " :shock: :lol:

If the hold up is cutting down those posts let me know and i'll pop opver with the chainsaw

 

[CHJ]

Good outcome Miles, as Paul said if you used a spindle roughing gouge on the outer then please don't use it again they are not strong enough to take the forces resulting from end grain impact, especially at that diameter, you risk them snapping or bending the tang.

As Paul said a stiff Bowl gouge held in a shear cut orientation should give a better cut without the tear.

The piece appears somewhat lighter in colour than the samples I have turned, unusual wood, the wood I had was very dense grained with little or no growth ring detail visible tough to turn but easily marked with a wood shaving or fingernail.

 

[miles_hot]

I fear I may have used an incorrect term - to get the thing into round (i.e. knock the corners off the blank after I'd butchered it on the bandsaw) I used the huge semi circle thing - straight across at the front with a 45 degree bevel - I thought it was called a roughing gouge but I guess not; any ideas what I should be calling it?

Thanks for the positive comments, glad you liked the WIP.

Miles

 

[miles_hot]

looking good mate - i reckon we can strike the turning lesson off the to do list as its apparent that theres little i could teach you.

that said how long til the big day - is there no way you can get the beds done in time as well .... i ask because i know i would be playing with fire if i said to sarah " I know i promised you this that and the other, but actually i havent got round to it, here's a nice bowl instead " :shock: :lol:

If the hold up is cutting down those posts let me know and i'll pop opver with the chainsaw

I have sorted out the cutting list and will hope to cut up the timbers for the raised beds tomorrow so (depending on progress) I could welcome your chain saw towards the end of the week.

Caroline is very relaxed about these things, thank goodness, that said it does sting a little when she very kindly mentions that she's not expecting to grow anything in the beds this year

Miles

 

[miles_hot]

Good work, I hope she is pleased.
When I screw in those rubber button jaw, I set the cordless drill clutch to 2. This puts them all in the same and it is far enough in.

I found that once I'd got the screws set into the hollow (flush with the top) I could happy screw the whole assembly in by hand. Seemed to hold fine.

Miles

 

[big soft moose]

I fear I may have used an incorrect term - to get the thing into round (i.e. knock the corners off the blank after I'd butchered it on the bandsaw) I used the huge semi circle thing - straight across at the front with a 45 degree bevel - I thought it was called a roughing gouge but I guess not; any ideas what I should be calling it?

Thanks for the positive comments, glad you liked the WIP.

Miles

"the huge semi circle thing" :lol: good to see you got the technical terms down

I think you are talking about a roughing gouge

tho it did cross my mind that you were talking about a round nosed scraper

you arent supposed to use the roughing gouge on face plate work because the tang isnt up to the torque and can break and go airbourne - better to use a big bowl gouge

you can use a round nosed scraper to rough down, but it will result in a lot of plucked and torn end grain

 

[big soft moose]

looking good mate - i reckon we can strike the turning lesson off the to do list as its apparent that theres little i could teach you.

that said how long til the big day - is there no way you can get the beds done in time as well .... i ask because i know i would be playing with fire if i said to sarah " I know i promised you this that and the other, but actually i havent got round to it, here's a nice bowl instead " :shock: :lol:

If the hold up is cutting down those posts let me know and i'll pop opver with the chainsaw

I have sorted out the cutting list and will hope to cut up the timbers for the raised beds tomorrow so (depending on progress) I could welcome your chain saw towards the end of the week.

Caroline is very relaxed about these things, thank goodness, that said it does sting a little when she very kindly mentions that she's not expecting to grow anything in the beds this year

Miles

as things stand i am free both thursday and friday (i'm off work all this week) though i do need to pick up a new chain to replace the one we trashed doing that ash .

That said i'm probably going to yandles on one or the other of the days but it doesnt matter which so let me know which is more convenient for you

 

[miles_hot]

as things stand i am free both thursday and friday (i'm off work all this week) though i do need to pick up a new chain to replace the one we trashed doing that ash .

That said i'm probably going to yandles on one or the other of the days but it doesnt matter which so let me know which is more convenient for you

I'll let you know depending on how I get on with the cutting of the planks - thanks

Miles

 

[miles_hot]

I fear I may have used an incorrect term - to get the thing into round (i.e. knock the corners off the blank after I'd butchered it on the bandsaw) I used the huge semi circle thing - straight across at the front with a 45 degree bevel - I thought it was called a roughing gouge but I guess not; any ideas what I should be calling it?

Thanks for the positive comments, glad you liked the WIP.

Miles

"the huge semi circle thing" :lol: good to see you got the technical terms down

I think you are talking about a roughing gouge

tho it did cross my mind that you were talking about a round nosed scraper

you arent supposed to use the roughing gouge on face plate work because the tang isnt up to the torque and can break and go airbourne - better to use a big bowl gouge

you can use a round nosed scraper to rough down, but it will result in a lot of plucked and torn end grain

I wasn't using it on the face - it was used for a cut which was parallel to the bed to make the blank round. The tear out I was getting was actually after I'd used the roughing gouge to make it round and was using the bowl gouge, skew, scrapper (anything! ) at normal lathe speed.

Got there in the end

By the way - if the roughing gouge is so fragile why is it used to knock spindle stuff into round from the initial square when this is a pretty brutal interrupted cut? I'm confused.

Miles

 

[CHJ]

Miles, When used for spindle work the roughing gouge only has to cope with side (parallel) grain, much like a pencil sharpener,

Think of trying to cut the endgrain of a piece of beech or oak with a penknife or bog standard record/stanley plane, much different from whittling the long edge.

The very fact that you have torn wood shows the tool was not cutting, just shearing by brute force the same as if you hit the middle of a plank of wood with a large hammer.

The narrow Tang in the handle WILL fail at some point due to a Bad enough Catch, either by bending or breaking with possibly very nasty results.

 

[miles_hot]

OK, thanks Chas and Moose for that correction. Something to remember, looks like the roughing gouge will joint the spindle gouge under the bench

Miles

 

[OldWood]

It is surprising how the message about using the roughing gouge does not get across to novices - sorry Miles if you don't feel you're one of those !

I've been turning for about a year (so am very much still a novice) and got ticked off recently at the wood turning club for this form of potential suicide. Since then I've spotted all sorts of turners doing just the same thing - and there's nothing like a novice-convert for putting everybody else right !!!

By the way Miles - well done and that's a lovely shape.

Rob

 

[Bodrighy]

I must admit to ending up with a right angled roughing gouge not long after I first started. Mind you it was one of those cheap ones that I had been given. Nowadays I do most faceplate work with a bowl gouge inside and out and spindle work with a skew or spindle gouge. My roughing gouge only comes out when I am turning down a branch and getting the bark etc off.

Pete

 

[miles_hot]

It is surprising how the message about using the roughing gouge does not get across to novices - sorry Miles if you don't feel you're one of those !

I've been turning for about a year (so am very much still a novice) and got ticked off recently at the wood turning club for this form of potential suicide. Since then I've spotted all sorts of turners doing just the same thing - and there's nothing like a novice-convert for putting everybody else right !!!

By the way Miles - well done and that's a lovely shape.

Rob

No worries OW - I am certainly a beginner, just having a very long learning period due to a lack of time / opportunity to turn

Thanks for the comments

Miles

 

[duncanh]

Part of the problem with roughing gouge confusion may come from varying terminology.
Most people refer to face plate work, spindle work, bowls, vases etc when none of these really describe the grain orientation, and that's what's important.
Spindle work is pretty much always done with the grain running parallel to the bed (although there are exceptions) so there is less confusion, but face plate work, bowls, vases and hollow forms can be with the grain running perpendicular to the bed (as in traditional bowl orientation) or parallel to the bed. For me it's about 50/50.

The problem would be cleared up if the tool was referred to as a Spindle roughing gouge and this would require manufacturers to name them as such.
I just checked the main manufacturer websites and most just call them roughing gouges - although some mention using them on spindles only or list them in the spindle section. Eg. Sorby say 'Roughing gouges must not be used on bowl projects.' but this doesn't cover not using them eg. on a blank for a hollow form mounted cross grain.

It's not surprising that there's so much confusion!