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Fixing cracks on roughed out bowl

R

Raif Harik

Joined
Jan 14, 2020
Messages
279
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Location
Austin, TX
Hi, I just roughed out a pretty big bowl. It already got some cracks, which if I were finish turning I would be fixing. Also some places where I can tell it's gonna wanna crack as it dries.
Should I just anchor seal it up and deal with it later, or should/can I start super glueing it up first then seal then dry? I'm thinking in the later case I may prevent further cracking. But I may also piss off the drying gods and introduce unholy stress.
As always thoughts and advice appreciated
Raif
 
I'm sure you will get varied opinions. Personally, most of my turnings are completely dried and acclimated to my shop before turning. However, those pieces I have turned that were not completely dry, I wouldn't bother trying to fix cracks in the rough turned piece. During the drying process, I would expect other cracks to form. Plus, fixing a crack before the piece is dry is likely (my opinion) to transfer stress to another point in the wood. If there is internal stress it's not going to disappear. It's similar to resawing a board into thinner pieces. If there is stress in the wood, the remaining board and the slice taken off will likely cup or twist.

I'd just dry the rough turned bowl with whatever method you normally use and let the bowl take shape. If there are numerous or very large cracks, I, personally wouldn't bother with it at that point. The piece was might just not have been meant to be. If the cracks are fixable after drying, then CA glue or epoxy (although I've never used eposy on a turned bowl) should fix the problems. However, you may need to fix more than once during turning as cracks are uncovered.

Not all pieces can be turned to completion.
 
If it's already cracking, adding anchor seal will just be wasted on this one. Drying wood is not mysterious nor controlled by any deity. You make sure there are no cracks showing in the original blank, make the walls and bottom are very consistent, and then control the rate of drying. Plus it is my very unpopular opinion that once the bowl or vessel has cracked, it is firewood. I have waaaaaayyyyyy too much wood to spend time making it look like I tried to fix a crack and was completely unsuccessful in making it disappear. To me, cracked vessels just shows that the maker was not skilled or experienced enough to dry wood.
 
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I'm with Robo - Once it has started cracking, it's pointless to try and prevent further cracking - only way I can think that *might* possibly help to stop the spread of the existing crack is to find the very end of the crack (ultra thin CA glue often does the trick to find that almost invisible point) and then drill a hole all the way through so at least half the hole intersects with the end of the crack - and even then it's like trying to shoot a mosquito with a .44 - more likely to fail than to succeed. I'd just continue the drying process and then evaluate when it has stabilized itself, chances are you'll find even turning away the cracks (or fixing the least of them) you're still going to end up with firewood & shavings, so - waste of time there- When I started with bowls, I tried to fix almost every crack that happened and salvage every bowl, but my results tended to perhaps 35% success, and given the time I wasted trying to save the other 65% I could have turned a couple dozen more bowls, so more and more I can look at a dried bowl from my stash and determine right away whether I can keep it going or toss it. (Just recently threw a 10 inch ash bowl with great grain into my firewood pile due to the amount of cracking and grain separation - almost seemed a shame, but facing reality I just knew the time spent on it would be far more than it'd ever be worth even to me personally as an artistic piece..)
 
I'll occasionally ca glue a small crack in a rough turned bowl and sometimes it works but it's always a crapshoot. If the crack is near the rim it's probably easier to turn that off and have a shallower bowl.
 
Like others have said a crack makes it unsuitable to finish as a bowl.
If it is pretty wood with a nice curve you can cut a few triangles ( or other shapes) from the uncracked sections.
These can be used in lots of ways one is mounting a clock or weather instrument in the curved face.
 
For me it depends on the piece potential and the drying process. I'll put thin CA on small cracks that I see as I'm turning a piece but at some point you have to decide if the cracks in a piece are character that will add to the look or defects that ruin it. And, is it worth the work to deal with them based on where they are. If it's a twice turned bowl then I'll use a little CA here and there before I lather it up with anchor seal. After that I don't. Does trying to stop one crack lead to another? Who knows. My gut feeling and experience is no and that a little thin CA in a hairline crack here and there does help. It's also easy to start chasing crack rabbits and end up with a whole bottle of CA on a piece that isn't worth the effort.
 
I rarely turn green these days, But if I do I will rough it out to the 10-15% over size, paint the outside with BLO place it in a paper bag face down in the coolest spot in the shop and check it periodically, as small cracks appear I just fill them with CA. But the type of wood is important, some species just wont comply.
 
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