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Rolly Munro 3/4" Hollower

Lamar Wright

Lamar Wright

Joined
Jun 29, 2017
Messages
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Location
Jasper, Alabama
Does anyone use Rolly Munro's 3/4" hollower? I am looking to purchase a hollowing system and I was wondering how this hollower measures up. I have been looking at all the hollowing tools out there and seems like they are all of good quality and all seem to do a good job for what they are designed for.

As I am new to hollowing forms and I'll be starting off with small vase's at first and later doing small hole hollow forms. Thanks
 
Be interesting to see the responses. I'm on the fence of buying the 5/8" for my hollowing system. It is highly regarded, but I wouldn't give up my articulating hollowing system for any hand held.
 
William Rogers said:
Be interesting to see the responses. I'm on the fence of buying the 5/8" for my hollowing system. It is highly regarded, but I wouldn't give up my articulating hollowing system for any hand held.
Click to expand...
Hi William, what do you have for your articulating system? I would think both articulating and hand held systems would be nice to have. I can see where both could be used on certain projects.
 
I have the Simon Hope Hollowing system. I bought it directly from the U.K. Took about a week. I got the camera system with mine. It comes with a 3/4" straight and bent bar and a carbide and scraper that you can use on either bar. I also bought the 5/8 bar that only has carbide cutters. The cutters are similar to the Hunter style cutters. It has been a learning experience as you can see in my thread where I was having problems. My 3/4" bars are fine. The reason I am looking at something for the 5/8" is my cutters are carbide and I was looking for something to smooth out the walls. The Rolly would be great, but very expensive, so thinking the Bosch scrapers. The only thing I would use hand helps for is small lidded boxes. I have several hand helds, Sorby Hollowmaster, Sorby swan neck and have never made them work like the video guy.
 
William Rogers said:
I have the Simon Hope Hollowing system. I bought it directly from the U.K. Took about a week. I got the camera system with mine. It comes with a 3/4" straight and bent bar and a carbide and scraper that you can use on either bar. I also bought the 5/8 bar that only has carbide cutters. The cutters are similar to the Hunter style cutters. It has been a learning experience as you can see in my thread where I was having problems. My 3/4" bars are fine. The reason I am looking at something for the 5/8" is my cutters are carbide and I was looking for something to smooth out the walls. The Rolly would be great, but very expensive, so thinking the Bosch scrapers. The only thing I would use hand helps for is small lidded boxes. I have several hand helds, Sorby Hollowmaster, Sorby swan neck and have never made them work like the video guy.
Click to expand...
Thanks William, yes, the Rolly is expensive for a hand held hollower. Maybe someone that owns one will let us know how well it is or not.
 
I have three different Munro hollowers.
One mini on a tapered 5/8 bar, a regular one on a 5/8 bar and a regular one on a 3/4 inch bar. I use them almost exclusively. They do tend to clog from time to time, but overall, after at least a decade of using them, they're my go to tools.
 
I've been using the Rolle Munro about five years now - it's a love/hate thing.
COMMENTS:
  • I'm a green-wood kinda guy which presents the tool with its challenges - found I can make it work on all logs but koa. I think dry wood is a "cake-walk" on most species.
  • I use the shield - I know guys that just use the cutter without shield - I find that too aggressive.
  • I do not use a captive until I get over 20" over the rest - because I use an internal tool rest with pivot pins, I can do up to 22" purely hand held. The 3/4 bar is adequate because, with internal rest, I don't get that far over the rest.
  • IMPORTANT: The shield setting is counter-intuitive. Common sense says the larger the opening the less likely to clog - I've found the opposite to be true. I set the opening to less than 1/16.
  • ALSO IMPORTANT: The tool requires pressure. It's always in a clog mode - you have to pressure past that.
  • I recently went back to the HSS cutters - sharpened on a Tormek with the little jig supplied with the tool, you get a lot of life out of a sharpening and several sharpenings out of each cutter. I've found that sharpening cutters is not a good time to have a beer.
Be ready to go over a learning-curve.
Good luck
 
George Guadiane said:
I have three different Munro hollowers.
One mini on a tapered 5/8 bar, a regular one on a 5/8 bar and a regular one on a 3/4 inch bar. I use them almost exclusively. They do tend to clog from time to time, but overall, after at least a decade of using them, they're my go to tools.
Click to expand...
Thanks George for your input on the Rolly. Are the cutters difficult to sharpen?
 
William Rogers said:
Be interesting to see the responses. I'm on the fence of buying the 5/8" for my hollowing system. It is highly regarded, but I wouldn't give up my articulating hollowing system for any hand held.
Click to expand...
Lamar, I have adapted my 1/2" ProForma to fit in my Kobra system, works great!
 
Lamar Wright said:
Thanks George for your input on the Rolly. Are the cutters difficult to sharpen?
Click to expand...
Not terribly difficult, the tool used to come with a sharpening jig. I'd assume that it still does and the instructions are pretty straightforward and simple.
 
Regarding the Munro and Pro-Forme tools....... I'm not a hand turner, but I was aware of the concept of the shield that limits the basic aggressiveness of the tool's design. The tools seem like a great idea that makes perfect sense to me. From the various videos they show nice streams of material flowing off the tools (something you don't always see with more conventional gouges). Presumably they don't require the skill needed with gouges.

What am I missing here? Why are these designs not more widely used?
 
Not as easy to sharpen is one reason. The Pro-Forme is more difficult because of the shape, but you also have to take the cutter out of the Munro and put the cutter on a fixture. Once you take them apart to sharpen, you loose the setting of the hood.
 
Doug Rasmussen said:
Why are these designs not more widely used?
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There are many reasons. They are good tools. With the hollowing rigs you can add a camera or laser to watch how thin you are cutting. Also larger boring bars can be used for deeper hollowing. And then there is a cost comparison. Most systems usually cost more, but the added capability justifies it IMO.
 
Doug Rasmussen said:
Presumably they don't require the skill needed with gouges.

What am I missing here? Why are these designs not more widely used?
Click to expand...

I have a Munro Hollower II on a stub shaft that fits into the end of my boring bar rig. While it's possible to use the Munro Hollower where you would ordinarily use a gouge, that isn't its purpose. It is meant to be used in place of scraper inside hollowforms. I use carbide cutters with my Munro Hollower and the advantages are faster wood removal and a smoother surface. The disadvantages include:
  • occasional to frequent clogging depending on the wood and depth of cut.
  • Long streamers ball up around the tool and more difficult to remove.
  • Fine tuning the position of the depth guard is a trial and error process of getting the right balance between clogging and depth of cut while simultaneously chasing a moving target of changing requirements.
  • Carbide cutters are expensive.
 
If you can afford it, I think both the Rolly tool and a good hollowing system wood be nice to have in your arsenal of turning tools. As I saw on a Rolly Munro video, sharpening looks to be a little challenging as others have mentioned.
 
Doug Rasmussen said:
At least one poster has mentioned the Munro and Pro Forme were developed to be used as hollowers. Don't they work just as well for turning the outside of bowls, etc?
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Hi Doug, I don't remember which video it was on youtube but indeed it showed a turner using the Munro on the outside of a bowl that he was working on. It looked like the Munro was taking a lot of material off the outside of the bowl.
 
Doug Rasmussen said:
At least one poster has mentioned the Munro and Pro Forme were developed to be used as hollowers. Don't they work just as well for turning the outside of bowls, etc?
Click to expand...

It could be used, but wouldn't work nearly as well as using a bowl gouge. It's not as versatile and there isn't a bevel to guide the cut. It seems to me that it would be cumbersome to try to get a fair curve.
 
Doug Rasmussen said:
At least one poster has mentioned the Munro and Pro Forme were developed to be used as hollowers. Don't they work just as well for turning the outside of bowls, etc?
Click to expand...
I watched Rolly Munro demonstrate over three days in Saratoga NY. He used his hollowing tool EXCLUSIVELY for everything including cutting a tenon, so yes, that tool can be used for pretty much any turning (in the right hands.
 
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