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woodPixel
2nd October 2016, 02:48 PM
I was watching a video by RoboHippy and he has a couple of angled drills for sanding bowls: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4Pkr89STGY

Does anyone know where I could acquire something like this?

edit - I do currently use one of these rotary tools and its mighty impressive: CWS Store - Rotary Sander (http://www.cwsonline.com.au/shop/category/-rotary-sander) but the very bottoms of bowls are troublesome.

hughie
2nd October 2016, 03:08 PM
I just use a standard pistol drill with variable speed, works just fine.

mick661
2nd October 2016, 06:51 PM
Not trying to be a smart A I do own a right angle drill for sanding bowls which I rarely make. The better finish you get of the tool the less sanding . So sharp tools for all cuts re sharpen for finishing cuts.Cut the grain in the right direction Go through the grades not 80grit start with 120 -400 if the finish is no good start with grits again or sharpen your scrapper and finish with grits again.
Mick

Paul39
3rd October 2016, 11:44 AM
I did a search in Google.AU and found:

https://www.bunnings.com.au/search/products?q=right%20angle%20drill&redirectFrom=Any

Total Tools - Search Results for right angle drill (http://www.totaltools.com.au/search/go?view=grid&w=right+angle+drill)

You folks have pretty slim pickings compared to us in the USA.

I have an earlier one of these which I bought used from a turning school.

3/8" Close Quarters Drill with Keyless Chuck (http://www.harborfreight.com/3-8-eighth-inch-close-quarters-drill-with-keyless-chuck-95877.html)

It had a bad bearing so the chuck wobbles a bit. I found later I could have bought it new for about the same price.

The drills I see advertised in turning catalogs have one year warranty except if they are used for sanding. I deduce from this that sanding dust is not good for a drill. I would not buy an expensive one for sanding bowls. Find something used, the regular pistol grip ones will work in most cases.

Get some 1/4 inch rod and make a few shafts long enough to reach inside the bowls you make. Epoxy some two inch chunks of timber on the end and make a fixture to hold the shaft in your chuck and turn it round with a slight curvature on the end.

This is a wooden drawer knob, about the right shape:

http://www.therusticfox.com/ekmps/shops/foxyloxytags/images/wooden-drawer-knobs.-furniture-pulls-handles-seconds--[3]-1326-p.jpg

Get some double sided foam tape and stick square pieces of sand paper on the end. Make the sand paper a bit bigger than the diameter of the timber. The oversize and square paper eases the sanding at the edges so you don't get ridges.

If you want more padding, get a piece of closed cell floor mat and glue that on to your sanding fixture.

I use double sided carpet tape for mounting sandpaper on sanding fixtures, and sanding disks I make from scrap timber to put in my chuck for bottom finishing.

I'm an old retired geezer and constantly look for ways to make things at a fraction of the price of "store bought".

ian
3rd October 2016, 01:34 PM
I was watching a video by RoboHippy and he has a couple of angled drills for sanding bowls: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4Pkr89STGY

Does anyone know where I could acquire something like this?

edit - I do currently use one of these rotary tools and its mighty impressive: CWS Store - Rotary Sander (http://www.cwsonline.com.au/shop/category/-rotary-sander) but the very bottoms of bowls are troublesome.
not being smart, but isn't a sharp scraper the correct tool for finishing the bottom of a bowl? No sanding needed.

woodPixel
3rd October 2016, 02:51 PM
I've read a great deal and also made a lot. After about 100 bowls I'm thinking of better methods not just for bowls, but all my turning (Im beginning segmented turning and every video I see has the demonstrators usings electric sanders)

So far the absolute best and MOST FUN is the rotary sanding tool. I love the way it generates an absolute torrent of dust. The DE sucks it down in a wonderful snake. Artful.

The very bottom, in the very centre, down near the nib is my most problematic part. Currently I use a bit of sandpaper, but it feels inaccurate. I can never get it dished properly or smooth flowing.

An angled drill isn't a requisite, but something I want to explore. Spending a little bit of money on things I enjoy is never a burden :)

I'll probably end up using an ancient makita drill thats doing nothing (poor thing has been here in its box for 6 years, it was my grandfathers when he was young!). Its OK, but its very noisy.

Paul39's wisdom is essentially what is done now. The very first commercial rotary sander had a bad glueup on the velcro, so it was glued back on... then I thought, "hey, why not make one for each paper grit?" to save me constantly ripping and swapping. 10 ball bearings from Ebay, a bit of threaded rod, nuts and foams and now there are 6 sitting here... (as an aside, young Marius did a video I happened to see yesterday on his designs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myBwALrpYeM )

Skew ChiDAMN!!
3rd October 2016, 03:23 PM
Not being smart :rolleyes: but even though ideally a finish should come off the tool, some timbers just don't want to co-operate no matter how we hold our tongues. Nor can we all afford to write off a piece simply because we can't scrape away that last little bit of tear-out..


The very bottom, in the very centre, down near the nib is my most problematic part. Currently I use a bit of sandpaper, but it feels inaccurate. I can never get it dished properly or smooth flowing.

It's the most problematic part for all RS's. As for the very centre/bottom... *shudder*

When using paper, have you tried wrapping it about a scrap section of thong? Much better than fingers.

(For our Northern bros, by that I mean part of a 'flip-flop.' Not part of SWMBO's delicates. :D)

hughie
3rd October 2016, 08:40 PM
When using paper, have you tried wrapping it about a scrap section of thong? Much better than fingers.

(For our Northern bros, by that I mean part of a 'flip-flop.' Not part of SWMBO's delicates. :D

Absolutely, thong rubber is brilliant stuff for sanding :2tsup:

smiife
4th October 2016, 07:49 PM
The very bottom, in the very centre, down near the nib is my most problematic part. Currently I use a bit of sandpaper, but it feels inaccurate. I can never get it dished properly or smooth flowing.


Hi woodpixel ,
Just use a cheap variable speed drill from bunnies for sanding
Or ...............for the very bottom of the bowl use a bowl gouge
with a shorter bevel !

hughie
4th October 2016, 08:39 PM
The very bottom, in the very centre, down near the nib is my most problematic part. Currently I use a bit of sandpaper, but it feels inaccurate. I can never get it dished properly or smooth flowing.

If your getting stuck with a little centre nub or nipple etc try something like this next time

https://mcjing.com.au/Static/Images/DSC02053.JPG

or

https://mcjing.com.au/Static/Images/DSC01864.JPG


Not trying to be a smart A I do own a right angle drill for sanding bowls which I rarely make. The better finish you get of the tool the less sanding . So sharp tools for all cuts re sharpen for finishing cuts.Cut the grain in the right direction Go through the grades not 80grit start with 120 -400 if the finish is no good start with grits again or sharpen your scrapper and finish with grits again.



In an ideal world, yes. But not all shapes and forms allow you to get in and cut away with your favourite bowl gouge whether you have a short angle on the bevel or not. There is one well known bowl turner that exclusively uses a round nosed scraper to hollow all of his bowls. He can get away with it as most of his blanks are soft wood
The conventional bowl with its wide opening certainly allows for this. I haven't turned such a bowl in a couple of years , these days its mainly hollow vessels and vase etc.

Heres one I currently finishing

Paul39
5th October 2016, 02:18 AM
As I do mostly open bowls, a bottom feeder bowl gouge followed by a 1 1/2 inch heavy round nosed scraper takes care of the bottom pretty well. For a difficult place in the center, sometimes a piece of sandpaper wrapped around some foam, sanding with the grain or round and round with the lathe stopped will take care of that.

What Hughie and other deep hollowers do is a completely different situation. My deep things are weed pots with mostly straight holes, nicely sanded toward the top of the hole, less so at the bottom.

WOODbTURNER
6th October 2016, 09:55 PM
I got a couple of these from I think Home Depot in the States for about $30.00. Of course they are 110v but I run them through a 240-110v converter. They are over 5 years old and are still working OK.396607