First Bowl

[Andrew Walls]

After 6 months of turning pens, ornaments and small boxes, I finally decided it was time to tackle a bowl. All those months of practicing tool control seem to have paid off and I didn’t make a funnel, but it was really a challenge. Hollowing out the inside was probably the hardest part for me, it looks soo easy when folks do it in videos! Then turning off the tenon after everything was sanded and finished was just nerve wrecking! I kept thinking I was going to do some to blow up the bowl. lol

Overall it was a good learning experience and I at least have a starting point to work from now.

Things I know I need to work on:
- Tool angle on the outside of the bowl, as I got a bit of tear out when transitioning to end grain.
- Consistency in the thickness of the wall, but I’m guessing this will be become easier with practice.

Any other critiques or advice would be appreciated.

 

[John Walls]

Welcome to the forum!
What I do when I run into tear-out is put a fresh/sharp edge on the gouge. Usually I will also drop down in size on the gouge, with the same, fresh sharpened edge. I shoot for shavings I call hair shavings, ie very light cut done slowly. Inside/outside, same. Inside transition cut still gives me fun occasionally.... Sometimes I get tear-out when tuning very soft/punky wood. Then I pull out the sander and finish that way but only if tear-out is very light. I'm still learning too, lately my problem is lack of time to turn much.

Side thickness, you got it, just takes practice.

Good luck!

 

[Sam Fleisher]

I think it looks good but I'm newer than you! I'm still working on tool control.
What kind of wood is that?

 

[Andrew Walls]

Welcome to the forum!
What I do when I run into tear-out is put a fresh/sharp edge on the gouge. Usually I will also drop down in size on the gouge, with the same, fresh sharpened edge. I shoot for shavings I call hair shavings, ie very light cut done slowly. Inside/outside, same. Inside transition cut still gives me fun occasionally.... Sometimes I get tear-out when tuning very soft/punky wood. Then I pull out the sander and finish that way but only if tear-out is very light. I'm still learning too, lately my problem is lack of time to turn much.

Side thickness, you got it, just takes practice.

Good luck!

Thanks, I’ll try lighter passes with a freshly sharpened edge next time, sounds reasonable.

 

[Andrew Walls]

I think it looks good but I'm newer than you! I'm still working on tool control.
What kind of wood is that?

Thanks! It’s maple with a couple coats of walnut oil. I’m trying food safe finishes first since it’s a bowl and I know my first few won’t be worthy of displaying as decoration pieces.

Getting proficient with your skew is a great way to learn tool control, just know that it’s a pretty harsh teacher when you use it incorrectly. There are some great YouTube videos out there on the skew.

 

[Sam Fleisher]

I was going to guess mahogany or something similar. Does the walnut oil stain it some?

Enough to remember with my gouges. Skews flat out scare me!

 

[Brian Gustin]

Getting proficient with your skew is a great way to learn tool control, just know that it’s a pretty harsh teacher when you use it incorrectly. There are some great YouTube videos out there on the skew.

Enough to remember with my gouges. Skews flat out scare me!

Also, you don't want to be using a skew on a bowl. (although used as a negative rake scraper can be OK, but then it ain't a skew at that point, is it?)

Just putting it up there so any newbies that may not know better and reading this don't get some dangerous ideas.... since the thread is about a bowl turning.

But other than that, I learned tool control with a bowl gouge before I became confident enough to try skew practice. Bowl gouge is a little more forgiving for learning, and typically has enough bevel to learn to float the bevel, so, to each his own..

 

[Dean Center]

Very nice first bowl.

The hardest thing, IMHO, in going from pens and spindle work to face grain turning, is keeping in mind the grain direction. It's not the same, so the way we use the tools is different in order to be cutting downhill.

As for wall thickness, I've been very surprised at how inaccurate my fingers are. Richard Raffan was an advocate of cutting bowls in half to check wall thickness, but I can't bring myself to do that. Regular use of a thickness checker will give you more accurate feedback than your fingers and speed up your learning. There are many different styles of checker, and I'm not going to recommend one over another. Something as simple as David Ellsworth's bent wire checker can work, but there are some much more sophisiticated ones that have some advantages.

BTW, everything gets better with practice.

 

[Roger Wiegand]

A few days spent throwing pots out of clay and immediately cutting them in half is a quick (and fun) way to train your fingers to read bowl thickness. I never got any good as a potter at all, but learned a lot that is valuable about both form/shape as well as the tactile part of making things in the round. The connection is much more direct when you're creating the shape directly with your hands. You can re-use the same lump of clay for quite a while, so there's little waste.

 

[hockenbery]

I use calipers with my finger.
I set them about a 1/4” wider than the rim with my finger under the outside one to protect the wood. Slide the calipers and finger down the bowl. When I get more pressure on the finger hollow more at this point.
If I get less pressure - stop making it thinner.

 

[Rusty Nesmith]

Welcome Andrew. Your bowl looks good. You aren’t too far from me. Not sure if you know this so to get less tear out on the outside cut from the tenon to the rim and on the inside from the rim to the bottom. I will sharpen my gouge and take a light cut for my final pass.

 

[Andrew Walls]

I use calipers with my finger.
I set them about a 1/4” wider than the rim with my finger under the outside one to protect the wood. Slide the calipers and finger down the bowl. When I get more pressure on the finger hollow more at this point.
If I get less pressure - stop making it thinner.

Good idea, I’ll have to give that a try.

 

[Andrew Walls]

Welcome Andrew. Your bowl looks good. You aren’t too far from me. Not sure if you know this so to get less tear out on the outside cut from the tenon to the rim and on the inside from the rim to the bottom. I will sharpen my gouge and take a light cut for my final pass.

Hi Rusty! Good to finally encounter another WV turner! I saw there was an AAW chapter down around Ripley, but that’s quite a drive.

 

[Rusty Nesmith]

Hi Rusty! Good to finally encounter another WV turner! I saw there was an AAW chapter down around Ripley, but that’s quite a drive.

Yes, Mountaineer Woodturners. I am a member. It is a great club. A friend of mine met a doctor that lives by you with a small plane. He ask my friend if he flew there if he would pick him up and take him to the meeting and my friend said yes. If that happens and you are interested I can try to get you in touch with him.

 

[robo hippy]

If I had to guess, I would say that is walnut, and not maple. I do like the bowl shape, especially for a first bowl. Mine were all 'dog' bowls, so more straight sides and a sharp transition at the bottom... I do have a lot of videos up on You Tube, mostly about bowl turning. Do check in with the club. Even if it is far away, they probably have members who live close to you, and we mentors love what we do....

robo hippy