Suspended spherical forms

[hockenbery]

These forms have a hollow ball in the middle and wings or legs extending out on the sides.
I hollow the ball held in a vacuum Chuck.

I originated these forms in 2004 after contemplating making a two handled Soren Berger scoop. While I probably would not have gotten there without seeing Soren’s demo, the only element of the scoop is the ball.

I tape the pieces to the vacuum Chuck to keep them from shifting.
I hollowed the first few without tape but found sometimes the hollowing would break the vacuum seal if the form was not quite round or the flair to the wing was close the chuck. The tape won’t hold it for hollowing but keeps the borderline pieces from shifting.

One design element is choosing the position of the hole or even turning several holes.

A variation of this is to cut the turning in half on the bandsaw before hollowing and make two “ceremonial” bowl turnings. I had not posted the video before because it was too large for YouTube in 2011.

The ones i do in the demo has a 3.5” ball. The pieces shown in the photos vary in size from 4.5” - 6.5” balls. Lengths go to 20” or so.



Transformation series: elm


Black walnut Selected for AAW Show
Some gifted Australian wood Sycamore
Historic Wye Oal

This is a video of a demo I did a few years ago showing the process

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVbzMx-aWiQ

 

[Mark Wollschlager]

I knew I had seen those around before.

 

[Fadi Zeidan]

Al,

You need to upload more videos, I always look for your videos. You are one of the few who teach technique not “watch me turn” on YouTube

 

[hockenbery]

Al,

You need to upload more videos, I always look for your videos. You are one of the few who teach technique not “watch me turn” on YouTube

Thanks for the kind words.
Most of the videos I post are recordings of demos I do for my club. Carl makes 2 DVD’s - he puts one in the library and gives me one.

One of My demo rules is don’t show off. In the demos I slow down and try to explain what I’m doing.
My rule of thumb for timing is 3-1. If I need 30 minutes to make and object at home, I need 90 minutes to demonstrate making it.

 

[Chuck Lobaito]

I want the sycamore!