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View Full Version : Turning a walnut bowl - FAIL!



Kuffy
18th September 2016, 09:31 PM
I had just completed turning a bowl this morning which turned out pretty good, so I decided to setup the camera to film the next one. For what appeared to be a pretty plain jane piece of walnut was actually nicely figured with plenty of chatoyance. God did a good job of growing that tree. I did a bad job of turning it into sawdust....:shrug:

It seems that drilling a 8mm hole for the worm screw deep enough to also act as my bowl depth guide is a bad idea.

"What if I remove 10mm off the bottom to steer clear of a defect???".
Well the answer to that question may seem obvious to the time served pros. But I am not one of those..but at least now I know the answer.
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Next time I will just drill deep enough for the worm screw and then drill it deeper on the lathe once I know how much material is left over after turning the bottom.


https://youtu.be/_2g9WBtqQYA

Dalboy
18th September 2016, 09:43 PM
It can be saved make a plug in a contrasting colour to fill the mortice and make a feature out of it. You certainly are not the first and will not be the last I did one like that a couple of weeks ago

Kuffy
18th September 2016, 09:49 PM
Yes, I am going to glue a piece of Maple onto the bottom. The sides of the bowl are still about 10-11mm thick so it can be salvaged.

DaveTTC
18th September 2016, 10:40 PM
Cool. I wanna see the save

Dave TTC
Turning Wood Into Art

Gabriel
19th September 2016, 07:33 AM
Change the title from 'fail' to 'opportunity to create unique piece'

Drillit
19th September 2016, 10:37 AM
me too. drillit.

Kuffy
19th September 2016, 12:12 PM
'opportunity to create unique piece'

I have thought about this all night and it seems like it is more of an "opportunity to spend a hell of a lot of time making a basic bowl".

I think if I just stick a piece of maple to the bottom it will look funny. So I will have to stick maple to the bottom and the top and that will be balanced, if I can find enough timber to do it. Though doing that makes it more work to get it mounted back in the lathe with the 10mm thick walnut section running true so I don't end up with 1/8" walls. I'll see how I go, but I'd be giving odds on that it will just be another fail.

smiife
19th September 2016, 08:42 PM
Hi kuffy,
Yeah , i wouldn, t worry just use it as a lampshade
and move on ......:U
It, s a shame cos it was looking good !:C

Simplicity
19th September 2016, 09:05 PM
Kuffy,
There's nothing wrong with it.
You are the problem it's a design feature.
You need to see past the hole to see the space.
Bring it along to a Melbourne gtg and we can all tell you how unreal it is.
Or take it to Gabs place this Saturday.

Cheers Matt

Jeff Leslie
19th September 2016, 09:35 PM
Kuffy, it's very hard to respond to this one without appearing a PITA.

The lesson is to always measure. I can say that I've had teachers all the way through such that I've never been through the bottom of anything. Close though!

As the guys have mentioned, there are a range of fixes. The tricky part is hiding them so that no-one knows the difference. Once, I gave a mate a pre-prepared blank of a Vic Wood off-centre rectangular box and he went straight through the bum.

At home, I made an almost flawless under-cut plus and guess what? Col went through the bum again!\

It was a waste of good bird's eye redgum but an instructive exercise. So don't be too hard on yourself. Mistakes? All of mine have disappeared into the fire.

Jeff

Kuffy
19th September 2016, 10:50 PM
LA LA LA LA, I'm not listening :D

It was broken, so I fixed it! It's a pity I don't do the same thing with my car...

170mm diameter x 70mm high. Myrtle and Walnut. Shellawax finish.

I received a few comments on facebook and a phone call about certain things I was doing.
- adjusting the tool rest while the lathe is spinning. It's bad. I know, the gloves I am wearing were brand new yesterday, now they will get into heaven because they are very holy.
- presenting the gouge with a fully closed face rather than rolling it open to 45degrees. I noticed this myself after watching the footage. It's good to have video of your own processes.

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https://youtu.be/uctKBl_n7nQ

DaveTTC
19th September 2016, 11:33 PM
Looks sweet as. As though it is hire it was always meant to be

Dave TTC
Turning Wood Into Art

Nubsnstubs
20th September 2016, 01:01 AM
Good save, Kuffy. It's tough to toss good looking wood when it looks like you should, but this case wasn't so. You had an opportunity for a design change, and it worked out. Again, good save......

One thing I would have done differently is I would have kept the tailstock engaged until I had the ID of the recess established, then remove it to clean up the nub. Other than that, it looks like you know what you're doing, and will be turning for a long time. Have you busted your knuckles on those nubs on the jaws yet? ............ Jerry (in Tucson)

Kuffy
20th September 2016, 01:32 AM
I was pretty careful when sanding the bottom with the cole jaws. Always sanded with my fingers pointing away from me so they dont get snapped in half. I kept the gouge well away from the nubs as well, ill hit it one day and put a hole in the ceiling or my jaw

Christos
20th September 2016, 08:05 AM
Very nice save on this bowl.

My thoughts were on the line of just adding a plug. Would not have done anything for the top of the bowl but you have managed to make this a very unusual piece. :2tsup::2tsup:

DaveTTC
20th September 2016, 08:09 AM
I away atm so cant watch the YouTube link but hope to when Im back home

Dave TTC
Turning Wood Into Art

Paul39
20th September 2016, 12:11 PM
Very nice, possibly nicer than the original would have been. I really like the horizontal band look.

StevoWoodi
21st September 2016, 03:54 PM
I concur. You can spend a lot of time fixing up this type of problem that could be better spent on the next bowl.
I have seen a number of techniques for checking the depth of a bowl but I have not been able to get past using a ruler, frequently. My daughter is happy to take the ones with a hole, I ask her to make sure that there is at least one piece of fruit in it! Nice timber BTW. Steve

Sent from my C6903 using Tapatalk

Kuffy
21st September 2016, 04:08 PM
Now I am drilling the hole for the worm screw about 30mm deep (screw is 25mm). Then I turn the bottom of the bowl, flip it around and measure how much meat I have to play with now that I have cleaned some thickness off the bottom of the bowl. Then I get my cordless drill and a drill a depth hole which will be suitable. about 1/2" from the absolute bottom which will have the 5mm mortise and about 7mm of meat left over to form the inside base. seems to be working well. I have made a few more bowls since this fail.

StevoWoodi
30th September 2016, 09:37 PM
Hey great recovery. Very nice outcome.

Sent from my C6903 using Tapatalk

Uncle Al
1st October 2016, 09:25 AM
I enjoyed watching both videos, looks like you had some fun in the workshop. I have made mental notes on the positioning of the dust extractor hose and the use of the large piece of ply with the sandpaper glued on for flattening the rim. Turned out to be a nice bowl, should hold plenty of jelly beans now!

Alan...

Kuffy
1st October 2016, 10:11 AM
The location of the the dust extraction hose hasn't had much thought put into it. It is just sticky taped to the main line. But it seems to work pretty well. After a day of making more dust than shavings with a dark wood, there isnt much dark crud up my nose. Keeping the hose below face level is ideal.

Mobyturns
1st October 2016, 09:29 PM
I received a few comments on facebook and a phone call about certain things I was doing.
- adjusting the tool rest while the lathe is spinning. It's bad. I know, the gloves I am wearing were brand new yesterday, now they will get into heaven because they are very holy.


Much more of a problem because you have to use a spanner to adjust and lock down the banjo - stay safe.

Kuffy
1st October 2016, 10:13 PM
I have turned a few more bits n pieces and I am trying to force myself to turn the lathe off to adjust the banjo, but mostly I forget until I burn a new hole in my gloves. It is annoying because the push start/stop buttons are kinda buggy so turning the lathe off means having to mess around turning it back on. Takes me 6 or 7 trys before I get the thing to stay on! I have to press the top right corner of the start button so it works without immediately clicking off.

Mobyturns
2nd October 2016, 06:58 AM
I have turned a few more bits n pieces and I am trying to force myself to turn the lathe off to adjust the banjo, but mostly I forget until I burn a new hole in my gloves. It is annoying because the push start/stop buttons are kinda buggy so turning the lathe off means having to mess around turning it back on. Takes me 6 or 7 trys before I get the thing to stay on! I have to press the top right corner of the start button so it works without immediately clicking off.

Please do yourself a big favour and fix the stop / start buttons, sort out the banjo, and loose the glove.

LA LA LA LA

Your tales are starting to sound like a very real recipie for DANGER. I don't think I want to read any more on this thread as I fear the next one will be the glove got caught on the blank and ripped my finger or half my hand off or smashed my wrist into the tool rest.

Sorry not being negative - but this really is unsafe!!!

mick661
2nd October 2016, 06:26 PM
You need one of these extremely over engineered pieces of equipment that every turner should have

Kuffy
2nd October 2016, 06:28 PM
Lol, I have several of those. They are all flat-packed at the moment, requiring final assembly. :D

mick661
2nd October 2016, 06:41 PM
Hahahaha ��

Pat
3rd October 2016, 03:57 PM
Kuffy, here is a Walnut bowl without a fancy bottom . . . you may recognise the character in the wood, since it's the blank that I acquired from you :;

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Kuffy
3rd October 2016, 04:06 PM
Cool. Nice work Pat. Yours look much better than mine. It also looks much deeper compared to what I am ending up with, because I tend to shave a bunch of material from the bottom AND the top.

What did you finish that with? Perhaps it is the lighting or photography but it appears to be a lighter brown colour than my bowls which are sanding sealer/EEE/shellawax.

Pat
3rd October 2016, 04:12 PM
Kuffy, Sanded to 600#, eee and a coat of Food Safe Oil. This is a user.

It has sections of real rich Chocolate brown thru to light, nearly Beige. There is chatoyance and some nice figure.

It was a fun blank to play with, as Walnut turns a lot easier than Aussie timbers that I generally play with.

Kuffy
3rd October 2016, 04:23 PM
Yes, all of that timber had a great deal of chatoyance throughout. The slab had the pith running straight thru the center of it and there was also a few knots in one side which caused the timber grain to twist and turn its way around the knots. I have another bowl here which actually has one of the knots running down the bowl side wall and the figure is tremendous. Though after turning and finishing with shellawax, it was kinda slippery and the bowl quickly found itself bouncing off the banjo, onto the lathe bed and then onto the concrete floor!!!! woops :D a fix for another day, the dings are only minor but the knot needs filling with some epoxy because my cheap n nasty solution of timbemate worked exactly "as expected".

Braveheart
5th October 2016, 05:33 PM
Thanks for the 2 vids, much more than a save, this design opportunity turned out far better than the original was going to in my opinion!