my first segmented bowl

[waterlogged]

Hi all , It all started after going to the newcastle woodworking show where i purchased my first lathe ( a comet 2 and 5 peice hamlet tool set and a bowl gouge from the carbatec stall ) having never used a lathe before i was pretty keen to get in to it , I'd been looking at utube and getting some ideas. I made 2 small lidded boxes and thought i'm going ok i'll make a segmented bowl next ( like the segmented wood turned wedding bowl by Frank Howarth on utube ) so first thing i did was to mark it out as big as i could to fit on the lathe and made all the segments, glued the bottom half together mounted it on a face plate and started turning. That's when i realised i didn't know how to turn and started on my learning curve with lots of catches and a few scares mostly when trying to turn the inside, I managed to get there in the end and glued the top half on and tried to turn the inside of that with the end result, the whole bowl broke off the base ( I had that many catches the base was way too thin to take the weight ) and flew through the air hitting the ground still spinning, well i was shattered and thought ill never do this and was going to bin it. Once i calmed down I decided to stick with it and make a new base from some hardwood , ( don't know what kind ) i had picked up somewhere, and to cut one segment out of the bowl so it was in half again, then glued a disc on the top so i could fit the face plate and turn the inside of both half's close enough that when glued back together they would only need sanding.I left the disc on top and supported the bowl with the tail stock while finishing the outside , parted off the top, sanded parted off the bottom sanded, 2 coats of boiled linseed oil , 4 coats of scandinavian oil , even though I have a lot to learn i think it turned out just fine in the end I was happy with the result.
base timber was some light coloured hardwood
light rings tasmanian oak
dark rings meranti
top pine

[Willy Nelson]

Wow
That is an awesome effort, looks superb.
What is more surprising is you did it on that lathe. I realise it was not a solid piece, but I am guessing it was light cuts the whole time. Even sanding would slow or stop the machine. Must have been a slow process, even without considering the catches, and re-doing the base etc
This would be a challenge for an experienced turner, let alone a first effort. My first efforts, well, let me put it this way, they are ash now. Yours won't be.
Well Done Young Man

Sincerely
Willy
Jarrahland

[Picko]

Nothing like jumping in at the deep end. Nice work.

[Gabriel]

Ripper job. Great shape and timber choices!!! I'm still scared about the prospect of segmenting so can't comment on that but talk about learning the hard way! Guessing now you have the taste for it a bigger lathe will be on the cards (but keep the little one for pens, finials etc)
Glad you didn't get disheartened by the first failure as I'm sure we all have wood fires full of 'amazing projects that went a little wrong'
Great write up and thanks for the photos too!!

Cheers
Gab

[artme]

In the words of Jack Gibson Played strong done fine!!