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View Full Version : Fiddleback on the inside or out?



Dean0
25th August 2015, 01:23 AM
I picked up some nice crutch pieces recently and have started to process them for turning. Red and grey iron bark and some pink bloodwood. Most have fiddleback that's why I grabbed them. Where do you guys put it? Inside or outside of the bowls? They were not huge rounds so should turn 300x 1500 max out of them with a section of good fiddle. I 1/4 sawed some to try and keep more but the loggers cut where they cut and many I didn't have a choice where to rip.
Cheers

D

Paul39
25th August 2015, 02:41 AM
DeanO,

I cut my crotches through the pith of the main trunk and branches so that the blanks are Y shaped.

I then make the bottom of the bowl from the center of the timber, the flat part of the blank.

I call the figure feather grain. Looking up fiddleback figure, I think we may be talking about different things.

Were I to make the bowl with the outside following the curve of the timber, with the flat part up, I think I would cut out most of the feather grain hollowing the bowl.

This is what I call feather grain, facing up is what I would make the bottom of the bowl:

http://www.woodweb.com/knowledge_base_images/zp/sawing_crotch_and_knot_wood_3.jpg

There is always risk of the feather not getting high enough to see from the inside, especially if one makes a spigot to grab with a chuck. One can always glue on a waste piece to grab and then turn that off when finishing the bottom.