Novice - skew chisel advice please

[Col]

Hi,
I've just started wood turning and have been playing around with some logs I had lying around for the woodburner.

I made a bowl blank from a piece of oak (air dried for two years?). After I'd cleaned it up with a roughing gouge I thought I'd try to use a skew chisel to do some basic shaping. I had already played around with a skew on a softwood (pine) spindle and thought I was getting the hang of it - when I was getting catches I could just about understand what I'd done wrong.

But the oak was another story. After rounding, even though I had a smooth surface with the grain, the surface was very rough in the areas against the grain. When I tried to use the skew, however careful I was to slowly come off the bevel and start cutting, after a few turns of the blank I would invariably catch in the rough grain big-time!

Appreciate any clues as to what I might be doing wrong please?

Thanks, Colin
P.S. I should say that all my 'firewood' now gets looked at first as a woodturning project and only if it fails that is it still firewood

 

[CHJ]

DO NOT attempt to use a Skew Chisel on a standard Bowl Blank in the standard Planing Cut Mode.

Risk of serious catch when hitting the End Grain presented twice in every revolution.

If you use a normal Hand Plain check the difference in performance between planning with the grain and Across the end grain.
Visualise this difference of loads being applied twice per revolution in rapid succession.

Thankfully you appear to have got away without serious injury, don't do it again.

 

[paulm]

I made a bowl blank from a piece of oak (air dried for two years?). After I'd cleaned it up with a roughing gouge

Also not a good idea Colin ! The roughing gouge takes too big a "bite" to use safely on a bowl blank, as well as having a short tang that is not strong enough to use like this and could bend or break when you get a catch.

You would be safer, and likely enjoy it more, if you you went along to a local club, did some reading about the basics, took some lessons, watched some Utube demonstrations or similar, so that at least you are safe and understand the tools and their usage.

Cheers, Paul

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Failing joining a club, Get yourself the Keith Rowley book Woodturning - a Foundation Course - ideally before you hurt yourself.

 

[KimG]

Failing joining a club, Get yourself the Keith Rowley book Woodturning - a Foundation Course - ideally before you hurt yourself.

From a perspective of learning to do it correctly, the above advice is excellent, you should buy, and read carefully the lessons in this book before you even think of picking up another tool or turning on the lathe again, so far you have been remarkably fortunate not to have suffered some minor injury, never mind a major one!

Just for your basic knowledge, both the Skew chisel and the Roughing gouge are tools intended only to be used for wood whose grain is aligned with the lathe bed and is supported between centres, and for the purposes of learning, probably best to keep the diameter of the wood under 3", at least until you've got the hang of things.


Bowls are roughed, cut and shaped with a Bowl gouge, though smaller ones can also be managed with a modern round bar spindle gouge.

 

[Col]

Thanks for all the replies - I thought it might be the case that the skew should never be used in this mode.

I have Keith Rowley's book and have watched several hours of youtube videos.

Although Keith's book groups the chisels into between centre tools and faceplate tools, through videos and other sources I had noticed flexibility in the way some tools are used across the two. e.g. a using a spindle gouge to hollow out small bowls.

At the moment I'm carefully experimenting with the capabilities of different tools and how to use them but I agree that the benefit of a club would be some 'never do this' advice for novices!

Thanks again for everyone's help.

Below is a picture of the projects over the last few weeks (the oak bowl in the foreground was the first project that was not end grain hollowing)

 

[KimG]

Those are some nice looking items Col, glad to hear you have the book. Beware of youtube videos showing techniques that are against normally accepted safe guidelines, they might get away with it, (but for how long?) others are unlikely to.

Welcome to the forum by the way, look forward to seeing more of your work!

 

[CHJ]

Col, have you watched the Understanding Woodturning Catches by Richard Raffan video linked in the Help Sticky at the top of this forum?

 

[SimonT]

Have a look at the instruction videos on YouTube by mike waldt, also known as the cymru boy. Just released his last of 9 instructional videos which is on skew chisels. Ive added a hyperlink but not sure if itll work.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f8v-59KFMhg

I know others have their ideas on these videos but ill be honest ive learnt most stuff off youtube (and here of course). Its ok reading a book but seeing the technique used as well as been taught tips helped me greatly, far greater than any book would as im a visual learner (and dont have the concentration level to read a full book).

I have to disagree on the worth of a book over a video. videos of people teaching you techniques is technically the same as reading about them - purely in a different format, for example the book youve read if it was in video format instead of written would the info be any less valid?

 

[Col]

Col, have you watched the Understanding Woodturning Catches by Richard Raffan video linked in the Help Sticky at the top of this forum?

Great pointer - just watched it through and plan to watch again (and again ...) - Thx

 

[Col]

Have a look at the instruction videos on YouTube by mike waldt, also known as the cymru boy. Just released his last of 9 instructional videos which is on skew chisels. Ive added a hyperlink but not sure if itll work.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f8v-59KFMhg

I know others have their ideas on these videos but ill be honest ive learnt most stuff off youtube (and here of course). Its ok reading a book but seeing the technique used as well as been taught tips helped me greatly, far greater than any book would as im a visual learner (and dont have the concentration level to read a full book).

I have to disagree on the worth of a book over a video. videos of people teaching you techniques is technically the same as reading about them - purely in a different format, for example the book youve read if it was in video format instead of written would the info be any less valid?

Simon - I have watched a few of Mike's videos but not this one - I will look out for all of his beginners guides. I agree with you that although the book tells you a lot, you can learn more from seeing and trying out yourself.

 

[YouSpinMeRightRound]

DO NOT attempt to use a Skew Chisel on a standard Bowl Blank in the standard Planing Cut Mode.

Risk of serious catch when hitting the End Grain presented twice in every revolution.

Am I understanding correctly that bowl blanks are normally taken from a vertical slice rather than a horizontal one? I never realised that.

 

[CHJ]

DO NOT attempt to use a Skew Chisel on a standard Bowl Blank in the standard Planing Cut Mode.

Risk of serious catch when hitting the End Grain presented twice in every revolution.

Am I understanding correctly that bowl blanks are normally taken from a vertical slice rather than a horizontal one? I never realised that.

This PDF may help, From a copy held on my web site

 

[YouSpinMeRightRound]

Very interesting. Thanks!

 

[procell]

Here is a short video on why you don't use a roughing gouge on a bowl blank.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOhHeyoZLaY