Any secrets to finishing natural edged work?

[Glenn M]

G'day All,

Finished my first natural edge bowl today and I am pretty darned happy with it as a first attempt. A lady at work was talking about how she had chopped down a plum tree a couple of weeks ago and I asked her to bring in a slab to let me see what I could make of it.

Today she gives me this length of plum wood that I chopped up with a hand saw (bloody hard work, must buy a bandsaw) and I endevoured to do my first natural edge bowl.

I'm really happy with the outside, but the inside could have been better. My tool rest wouldn't reach in deep enough so I didn't have very good control of the chisel (just need more practice) so the inside base is a little wonky.

Anyway, I digress. The hardest part I found was sanding it, the outside wasn't so bad using my little rotary sander but the inside was a mongrel and the plum has more than a few nicks out of my nuckles.

So is there any black art to sanding natural edge work, or am I just going to carry on cutting myself up?

Thanks folks.

p.s. This was also my first time at working with *green* wood. Top fun!!!



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Glenn
www.woodworkbooks.com

[ubeaut]

Good fun aren't they Glen. You can use your sander on both inside and out. Run the lathe as fast as is safely possible and you should be able to sand it as if it were a normal bowl. Just watch out near the outside edges and keep the sander on the right angle and all will work fine.

For traditional sanding also run as fast as possible and don't press too hard in the timber. You may find a wad of rag wrapped tightly with the sandpaper over the top will also help as will holding a wad of rag on the outside of the bowl and following exactly the movement of a rag wad and paper on the inside will also help.

The faster you run the lathe the smoother and easier the sanding becomes. Just make sure that the bark is firmly attatched and if not peel it all off and go fore a wane edge instead. A full face shield is also a wise move when working with bark edges, etc.

Hope this makes sense to you.

Cheers - Neil

[Island Ape]

Hi Glenn

The bowl dose not always have to be turning when you sand it! Sometimes, and often on natural edge bowls, Stopping the work and sanding the rough spots is the only way to go. You can do this by hand, or use one of those rubber thingys in a drill, rocking the work with your left hand and just lightly sanding the surface. Finishing off sanding while turning.
One trick I use is to find the rough spot, sand with the drill and then blow out the dust with a compressor, as somtimes the dust tends to fill the tiny holes from the torn-out grain. And you can take a bet on it, if you've found some torn-out grain, almost exactly on the opposite side of the bowl there is still some more to find.

Island Ape

[Glenn M]

Thanks for the replies guys, makes a lot of sense! I should be able to get more of this plum wood because I am giving this bowl to the lady who has it all on her property. So with a bit of luck I will have plenty to experiment with.

And darn it all, I just remembered my wife has a Dremel, I could have used the buffing pad with that as well...

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Glenn
www.woodworkbooks.com

[Jeff]

I've turned a bit of Plum wood, and find it takes a very fine detail cut and needs very little sanding. I would suggest you spend more time improving your tools/cutting technique than becoming proficient at snading! Figure out why you are getting the rough surface in the first place. It sounds like perhaps your mounting (of the wood to the lathe) may be a tad wobbly, or your tools not sharp enough. Tools rarely are too sharp! Also, as you by now may have found out, the Dremel will leave little burn marks even at the lowest speed, and they are even worse to get out. Again, look to the goal of better (smoother) cutting rather than sanding. Incidentally, Plum is my favorite turning wood because of how nicely it finishes, and if you have lots of it you should feel quite fortunate about that! Ignore any idea that it being natural edge makes any difference whatsoever about how it turns or finishes, it is still wood, it still has the same properties. Good Luck.

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"Always cutting corners...!"