A 6 x 6 x 6 block of cedar with a 3 x 3 x 3 block glued to one end and a 2″ diameter waste block tenon glued on the other. The pieces were a gift of John Kauer.
Partially turned:
Hollowed out
mounted in reverse to hollow out the top and then put together to sand so the top and bottom match:
Finished with walnut oil/carnauba wax/beeswax
From a scrap of a 6 x 6 cedar post:
top
bottom
Thanks to John Kauer for the wood. (He now has the bowl)
A cherry log was sawn in half and mounted asymmetrically between centers with the bark in the head stock side and a tenon cut on the tail stock side.
After the tenon was formed the piece was reverse mounted in the 4-jaw chuck and the inside removed leaving the natural edge as shown.
However, as you can see at the bottom of the picture, the bark had come off in places destroying the nice natural edge:
So, the bark was removed (It came off pretty easily and so probably would not have survived anyway):
The finished piece after sanding and waxing and oiling with Mahoney’s Oil Wax finish (walnut oil, carnauba and beeswax)
This was inspired by http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qtcbic9TgX0 ric47scroll
Bowl from the driftwood tree (6″ x 3.5″)
Turned from the same driftwood tree as the candle sticks. (I still don’t know what kind of wood it is.)
The rough turned birch bowl from April 2012 had reached it’s final weight.
So I turned off the edge to get rid of the pith, shaped it, scooped out the inside, sanded and finished it with Howard’s Feed-n-Wax (beeswax, carnauba wax and orange oil).
Reverse mounted it in the Cole Jaw chuck to turn off the tenon and the shape the bottom.
The black holes and lines are tracks left by small (<1 mm) beetles that evacuated the bowl during one of the early micro-waving drying steps.
Several of the tracks (e.g. the little hole on the left of the bottom rim) go all the way through.
(See also the earlier post for details)
Another bowl from Brandon and Sharon’s japanese maple tree. I gave this bowl to Sharon for her birthday.
It was rough turned and allowed to dry for several months. At first I turned a dovetail in the bottom but a weak spot caused it to break out while I was turning the inside.
So I filled the dovetail with a piece of turned 2 x 4 and epoxied it to the bottom and screwed a faceplate to it. And allowed it to dry/warp for another month. The maple had become very hard at this point and I was getting a lot of catches even while taking very light cuts and being very careful. I tried using a scraper to remove the gouges made by the catches and got catches with that – a very difficult piece to turn. I got a catch and the epoxied tenon broke off. So I made another one and glued it on and eventually, as a result of another nasty catch, it snapped off as well.
So I mounted it the Cole jaw chuck and turned the remainder of the tenon off and turned some of the bottom off so I could turn a ~4″ diameter tenon in the maple and reverse mount it in the 4 jaw chuck with new 100 mm jaws. (had been using 50 mm jaws before in expansion mode). After nearly giving up several times, I turned the piece very carefully with a sharp scraper and fresh cutters on the EasyWood Tools (the rougher and the finisher) with very, very light cuts – it took a long time but in the end well worth it. As with most things, persistence is the name of the game.
Cherry bowl (5 1/2″ x 1 3/4″) turned from a cherry log that was a gift from Tom Tutor.
First cherry bowl – Cherry is a pleasure to work with.
Info on cherry
Poplar (quaking aspen, popple) bowl (7 1/4″ x 3″) finished with beeswax, carnuba wax and mineral oil
The green “accent” lines are likely seaweed that had soaked into the wood. Or possibly some type of marine bacterium.
The surface came out perfectly smooth after sanding – surprising given the fuzzy mess that I started with.
Intermediate stages. The log (see below) had been in salt water at Sprauges Beach, Islesboro, ME for who knows how long – drifting in and out with the tide, and was very wet and very soft. This picture shows it after I tried turn it and had given up. I started turning it in August 2011; it was soaking wet and there was so much tear-out that it seemed impossible to deal with. So it was chucked in the burn pile. And this week-end (May 4th, 2012), I decided to have another go at it. It seemed to have lost several pounds of water and was now very light. And you can see in the pictures above that it turned out amazingly well. 
This is the log I started with (I had thought it was beech when I found it)
I cut a slot in the top (this was before chain saw) about an inch deep
and drove three wedges into it.
and got a pretty good split right down the middle. Lucky, I think, given the branch sticking out the side.
The end on view looked like it might have some promising figure.
Drilled a 3/8″ hole and
inserted a wormwood screw
Mounted it on the lathe to find the center and the removed the wormwood screw and cut it into a roughly circular cross section on the bandsaw. Put the wormwood screw back in and turned it to get the piece shown above.
Actually, it was so soggy that the wormwood screw stripped out its hole. That’s when I gave up and sent it to the burn pile. In the end I turned it between centers to cleanup the outside and cut a tenon on the bottom, mounted it in the 4 jaw chuck and then scooped out the inside and trimmed the top edge. I finished the bottom flat after reverse mounting it in the Cole chuck.
This birch log was filched from Reid and Jewell Hausmann’s driveway right after it was cut and then ripped in half with the chainsaw:
Half log was mounted with the faceplate and the center determined and then trimmed to almost round on the bandsaw, as described below in an earlier post.
It was then remounted and turned
It was rough turned
(and was so wet it sprayed water/sap on the floor of the shop)
The outside of the bowl shaped and a tenon turned on the bottom and then
reverse mounted in the 4-jaw chuck
and then hollowed out, leaving about 10% of its width.
The wet wood makes these nice, long, linguini-like shavings.
After rough turning, the bowl was put up to dry for a few months. I have weighed it and will follow the drying by re-weighing it from time to time until its weight levels off.
When it is dry enough, it will be turned to its final shape and thickness.
After 60 days of spending time in the basement (high humidity) or upstairs (lower humidity) and a couple shots in the microwave on day 44, and then back to the basement on day 46, the weight seems to have stabilized around 750 grams, having started at a little less that 1300 grams:
After drying for 60 days:
The bowl has cracked a little around the pith on the far side; so the top edge will have to be turned down below that point.
For the final result see June 3, 2012
Bass wood dried for 20+ years; split and turned. (4 1/2″ x 1 1/2″)
Turned another small bowl that I had intended to fill with shaving soap to use with the shaving brush. But it turned out a little too big for that and might make a nice bowl for mixed nuts — or whatever:
This little bowl was made from Brandon and Sharon’s japanese maple.
(5 3/4″ dia. x 2 1/2″ h.)
Many, many years ago, my brother Reid gave us a sculpture in marble named Ernie. It came with a table whose legs were made of black locust. We cut the legs to shorten them to give Ernie a lower profile. I have kept those legs (of 4×4 lumber) for almost 40 years.
This little bowl was turned from one of Ernie’s 4×4 legs: (3 1/2″ x 2 1/2″)
This shaving brush was turned a couple of months ago from Brandon and Sharon’s japanese maple tree; yesterday, I turned the bottom to clean it up after making a chuck to hold it; and it was finished with cyanoacrylate to make it water-proof; and then the bristles were glued in with cyanoacrylate (AKA super glue) to complete it. This shows it after it has been used once.
This is a practice natural edge bowl – first one.
I cut a small blank from an ash log:
and ended up with (side view) ( 4 1/4″ x 2 1/4″)
End view:
Flat bottom, slightly concave. Used a jam chuck to turn the bottom.
Several errors: The pith runs through the bottom (not shown) and is already falling out, and I cut off too much of the bark on the top. So maybe that’s a feature.
I had harvested a birch bowl from a dead birch tree on John Kauer and Barbara Talamo’s land. I had to cut it into three pieces to get it home.
I started with the smallest piece mounted between centers:
Rough turned it with lots of tear-out
The bark inclusions, cracks and some punky bits were stabilized with CA glue. In the end after I had broken the tenon off, I turned a recess to finish it up using a combination of the cole jaw chuck and the 4 jaw chuck.
Finished it with carbauba and beeswax.
( 6 1/2″ x 2 1/2″)
Napkin ring
I created a special jig to hold it in the lathe:(inspired by a video by Bob Hamilton: bobham5)
I took an oak cylinder I had turned earlier, drilled a 1″ hole in it and turned the outside diameter to 1 1/2″ to match the the inside diameter of the napkin ring to be.
on the band saw I cut four slots to make it into an expansion jig (expanded by the live center on the tail piece)
and then chose a scrap of japanese maple left over from the turning of the japanese maple bowl and drilled a 1 1/2″ hole in it.
Trimmed it on the band saw and mounted and turned it on the expansion jig
I finished it with beeswax and carnauba wax.
I started with a birch log (a gift from Gilbert Rivera):
cut it in half with the chain saw:
Mounted the blank with the wormwood screw turned the outside and cut a tenon on the bottom.
Then I mounted the bowl on the 4 jaw chuck to turn out the inside.
And used the live center tail piece to stabilize it.
then I turned off the inside tenon and in the process, accidentally broke off the foot tenon (in the 4 jaw chuck).
So I glued it back on with CA glue and
tried turning it again sometime later and broke off the tenon again. So, I reverse mounted it in the Cole Jaw chuck and turned a recess in the bottom to hold it in the expansion chuck.
Final result, after thinning the walls and turning down the top edge and adding some detail (finished with beeswax, carnuba wax and mineral oil):
(9 1/4″ x 4 1/2″; biggest bowl so far)
Bottom view showing the recessed bottom.
Inside
Detail
From the left over pieces of the log used to make the japanese maple bowl,
I made two shaving brushes:
and gave them to Brandon and Ben for Christmas
More detail:
For Ben.
and for Brandon.
Japanese maple bowl ( 7 1/4″ x 3″)
The blank for this bowl was cut from this half log:
which is the other half of this log:
The Japanese Maple came from a tree that Brandon and Sharon had to cut down. Brandon cut up most of the trunk into logs and painted the ends. It should yield many bowls.
The ends of the logs were painted to slow the drying process to reduce the tendency to check and split.
In process on the lathe
November 20, 2011
After “success” with the candlesticks, I went down to the shore at low tide to cut up the rest of the driftwood tree.
Nice day for it.
The driftwood tree
The cut-off end showing where I had gotten the log from which I made the candlesticks. That was cut with a buck saw last August – BCS (before chain saw)
Job partially done.
Done
All ready to haul home
Piled up and ready to haul back to the stairs and then up 40 steps to the top of the bank.
Piled in the basement not too far from the lathe.
Don’t know what kind of wood it is. Might be locust based on the color, texture and grain of the candle sticks. (The shape could use a little more work … next time.)
(Background) a drift wood log off the “beach” (see the above photo),
(L) piece left over after cutting the part I wanted to use,
(M) the first candlestick with the tenon still on,
(R) the other half of the cylinder to be used for the second candlestick.
turned and sanded in the 4 jaw chuck. The tenon is still on the bottom.
Mounted in the Cole Jaw chuck to turn the tenon off the bottom, and hollow out the bottom a little.
Final result:
Finished with beeswax, carnuba wax, and mineral oil
(a.k.a. Howard’s Butcher Block Conditioner)
Turned from the same piece of oak firewood as the box. The stem and the goblet bowl both cracked. (2 3/4″ x 6″)
Beech bowl – rescued from the junk pile – re-turned with the Easy Wood Ci0 and Ci1 tools and finished with beeswax, carnuba wax and orange oil. (4 1/4″ dia.)
This is most likely apple.
Started with a small log:
resawed it to get a good blank with the pith off to one side. This is the leftover piece.
I then rounded it out on the band saw and mounted a faceplate on the flat side:
And turned the bottom:
This shows the tenon with extra bit cut off:
This was then mounted in the 4 jaw chuck to turn the inside of the bowl:
Some of the inside was removed first with a forstner bit:
Started cutting out the inside:
Reverse mounted it in the jam chuck to turn off the tenon and tidy up the foot.
Finished bowl (4 1/4″ dia.)
Bottom view:
Oiled with orange oil
After drying a little and having warped and
after applying beeswax, carnuba wax and orange oil mixture:
November 6, 2011
Small bowl from Beech.
Using the new Easy Wood Ci0 and Ci1 cutting tools to under-cut the top edge.
