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Turned my first large sycamore bowl.. Got the C#$@p beat out of me.

G

Greg Carles

Joined
Aug 22, 2022
Messages
124
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Location
Kenton, OH
Hi everyone, as you may know I am new to turning and especially bowl turning. I do value everyone's advice on this forum.
So I have several " wet" sycamore bowl blanks ready to go for turning. I have had the intro to bowl turning class at Wood Craft this past Sept.
So here is my question.
While turning this bowl it was extremely difficult to do , both outside and inside. I felt like I was taking a real beating, so to speak.
I don't know if it is just the species of wood or if the lathe speed was too slow ( I was around 500-550 at this point) or what???
My tools are razor sharp and that is not the problem.
My walnut bowls turned fairly easy compared to this sycamore.
On the hollowing I was literally beat up by the bowl gouge trying to hollow out bowl, so bad it came loose from the tenon, but luckily did not fly off though...
I re-tightened and continued, noticing that the gouge just couldn't find the right mo-jo and was giving me all kinds of trouble. (I had tool rest adjusted to just inside the bowl so as to not have too much over hang off the tool rest.)
By this time the bowl was not longer true to the lathe spindle any more. From all the rough turning.
I pressed forward and finally got the bowl roughed out on the first turn of twice turn.
Here is a pic, wife picked the design.
But any advice is appreciated. I felt defeated at the end and not understanding what was going on.
Other people on you-tube said sycamore cuts like a hot knife through butter???

IMG_20221005_160958166.jpg IMG_20221005_160917274_MP.jpg IMG_20221005_160925664.jpg
 
Greg Carles said:
both outside and inside. I felt like I was taking a real beating, so to speak.
I don't know if it is just the species of wood or if the lathe speed was too slow
Click to expand...

Probably not the wood or the lathe speed.
Unless you got an unusual piece of sycamore it should turn about like the walnut.
Both are softer hardwoods sycamore being a little softer but not prone to tearout like a willow.

My guess is you are coming off the bevel, tool rest too low, and/or
maybe turning the flute up too much up from horizontal
A trick for keeping the flute off vertical - take a red sharpie draw a line down the bottom center of the flute. You should never see the red line ( unless you are purposely doing an advanced cut)

Also you may be pressing the bevel too hard against the wood - that will beat you up as well as keeping the gouge from cutting.

1. Adjust the tool rest - I like the tool cutting at center when the tool is level to the floor
2 Float the bevel on the wood
3 cut with longer fibers behind the one being cut
4 Cut toward the headstock or tailstock.
 
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One other thought is the profile of your gouge. It needs to be a continuous convex edge from wing to wing
Flat is ok but no dips

Not sure what style gouge you were taught. If it is similar to the Ellsworth you may find this useful
There is a video of how I rough a bowl.
It may confuse you if you were taught the 40/40

Working with green wood

The August 2015 AAW JOURNAL has great article by David Ellsworth on working with green wood. This is followed by 11 marvelous ways turners turned cracks into features. One of David's themes is that the deck is stacked against newer woodturners successfully working with wet wood. Might be a nice...
www.aawforum.org www.aawforum.org
 
hockenbery said:
A trick for this is take a red sharpie draw a line down the bottom center of the flute. You should never see the red line ( unless you are doing an advanced cut) untill
Click to expand...
Thanks for all the very good information. Did you stop mid sentence?? Untill ????
Thank you I value your advice. I may have not been horizontal now that I am recollecting the turn from my memory... also I may have opened the flute too much. Good tip on the sharpie-- so the flute stays closed during the hollowing? I thought we turned it open in class but we were going so fast and I tried to take notes but a lot of information in an 8 hour class.
You mention good fundamentals for sure !
 
hockenbery said:
It may confuse you if you were taught the 40/40
Click to expand...
Yes I was taught using the 40/40 bevel at class and my gouge is the standard 45 degree with fingernail type grind. I have been contemplating changing to a 55 degree bevel on my gouge.
It is a 3/8 Henry Taylor signature " super flute" M42 gouge from Craft Supply. I kept the grind that came with it because I am new and don't fully understand all the different angles.
On a side note , I do not have a bottom bowl gouge and have to use my bowl scraper to finish the lower third of the bowl. Although I want to get one hopefully for Christmas,,,,
 
Greg, great advice and tips above. I've worked quite a bit of sycamore and it's not a tough wood to turn. The only thing I would add is that any time I feel I'm fighting to get through a piece or some cuts it's almost always a dull edge. Not uncommon to think it's sharp. It looks sharp, feels sharp but - it's not or one spot or edge is not sharp. I assume you're freehand sharpening. Not something I know how to do but know that when I've tried it's a lot more difficult than it looks. I always put a thin sharpie mark along my gouge edge before I sharpen and while I seldom miss an edge it does sometimes still show after I sharpen which means I need to take another pass.
 
Greg Carles said:
so the flute stays closed during the hollowing? I thought we turned it open
Click to expand...

Basic hollowing hollowing cuts
entry cut - from air to the rim the flute is closed 3 o’clock
Past the rim the flute can be rolled up to about 45 degrees 2:00- 1:30.

As you know the 40-45 degree is limited in hollowing depth to where the tool hits the rim.
You can hollow with scrapers as a bridge to your bottom of the bowl gouge acquisitions

Some turners do all their hollowing with scrapers
I find a gouge works better for me
 
It sounds like having the flute too open is likely your biggest problem. Here's a simple rule of thumb: Until you're well along the learning curve, don't ever use a bowl gouge with the flute pointing straight up. It's not a spindle roughing gouge for bowls. With a bowl gouge, I suggest learners have the flute at a 45 degree angle--that is, half way between straight up and straight horizontal. In this position, that red stripe down the bottom of the flute will often be just hidden by the edge of the flute

In general, when the gouge is bouncing and fighting back, the 4 things that can explain it are:
1. Really hard wood
2. Gouge needs sharpening
3. Advancing gouge too fast
4. Pressing the bevel against the wood

Since the wood isn't going to get less hard, the solutions would be to sharpen your tool, slow down the speed of advancing the tool, and soften your hands. Do all 3, not just 1.

Newer turners are tense and usually have a white knuckle grip on the tool, often with both hands. Experienced turners are more comfortable/confident and are able to hold the tool with relaxed hands, which makes for better cuts. They also know not to hurry the cut.

Once you've been bouncing for a bit, there will often be ridges in the wood, exactly like washboard on a gravel road. Ridges beget more and deeper ridges. It's very hard to turn smoothly when the wood has gotten ridges, so you have to cut them off in order for your sharper, slower, more softly applied gouge to work well. You can do this by starting a new cut, a little deeper (which means you'll really have to advance slowly and have soft hands) so that the bevel is floating/gliding on a smooth surface, OR you can take off the ridges with a scraper, especially a negative rake scraper.
 
People turned on man powered lathes for centuries, speed is not an issue unless you push the gouge too fast and hard. One class at Woodcraft would barely scratch and itch to turning skills. After 10 classes you will have a good baseline. Not all instructors are created equal either. Have you taken a sharpening class? Dean is right on with the advice to relax. Even after my 35 years of turning, I still have to remind myself on occasion. It's also much easier to turn a bowl with a smooth curve on both the inside and out. Near vertical walls make the transition with the bottom a real challenge. If the sycamore is wet, you will likely see some cracking really soon. Sycamore moves a ton from wet to dry.
 
I’ll add my $.02 to the conversation. (Forgive me if this has already been mentioned). Your bowl is fairly deep with steep sides. That’s harder to cut smoothly than a shallower, more open sided bowl. As Al mentioned above, you’re cut is limited once the rim gets in the way of the tool. I just harvested a bunch of wind-thrown sycamore, and it was pretty smooth cutting. On the order of soft maple.
 
There’s a greater chance at getting hurt if you’re getting beat up by a piece of wood. There’s just too many things we can’t see in a text msg to know for sure. You’ll find turning is great fun once you get over this initial hump. Suggest finding a local turning club and latch on to a mentor if possible. Many clubs like mine offer free one on one training.

Also, post some closeup pics of your gouge tip here from different angles. If no problems are obvious then you might want a local turner to examine and then take your gouge for test run.
 
Well, I would have to have been there to be able to tell you what was going wrong. Sycamore is a very soft wood, and also has a very high water content, which means it warps a lot as it dries. The 10% rule generally does not apply to twice turning sycamore. As thick as that bowl appears, I would expect it to crack. Sycamore will suck up finish like nothing you have ever seen. Walnut, for some reason, or reasons, dulls my tools more than most other woods. My guess would be that it is tool technique, and not the wood. Also, for sycamore, when prepping a bowl blank, you want the center of the tree to be the bottom of the bowl. There are spectacular medullary ray patterns that only show up with quartersawn pieces.

robo hippy
 
Thanks everyone for your comments. I am still very new to this and only one formal training class. I have decided based on the comments that my technique is the issue. I am still learning.
I need to make sure the gouge is cutting on center (excellent point) and not force the bevel against the wood. I am going to have to better understand when the situation gets tough to stop and evaluate what is going on. On the smaller bowls I did not experience this issue much. could be a gouge angle issue because this was a 10 inch bowl and I had only been doing less that 7 inch bowls.

Also to Robo Hippy comment on the bowl cracking, you are spot on, the top edge is cracking some even though I put anchor seal on the end grain directly after turning it.
This is going to be a twice turned bowl so hopefully I can get some of the defects out on the second turn.
 
I agree with you on that. I can see it more clearly in the pics after I look at them closely. I am grinding the sides longer than the tip causing the concave shape.
 
So I am FAR from an expert on grinds and many more here can give you better advice, the only thing I would do if I was handed the gouge in your pictures is take a good bit of the heel off. I find if I leave the full bevel on that the ever so slight curve makes it harder for me to stay on the cut.
 
Greg, I also use a Tormek for sharpening my tools. I like it because I can get a smooth surgically sharp edge on all of my tools. As previously mentioned it looks like the wings have been excessively sharpened causing them to be thin and concave. The latest grind looks better, but I am concerned that the 45° bevel angle is rather aggressive and might be difficult for a beginner to control. I think that a 60° nose angle like the Ellsworth grind would be a better way to start. Also, I agree with Randy that you should grind off some of the heel of the bevel because it will get in the way when turning the interior of a bowl.
 
Those grinds maybe too sharp an angle, but they’re still usable with the proper technique. Finding a mentor to watch over your shoulder might be worth a short drive. Until then stay safe and keep your tailstock engaged as long as possible.
 
Bill Boehme said:
Also, I agree with Randy that you should grind off some of the heel of the bevel because it will get in the way when turning the interior of a bowl.
Click to expand...

I am going to take some of that heal off later today.
As far as an aggressive grind angle goes, I did learn on a 40/40 grind bowl gouge at class and did not have much trouble using it. I do want to investigate further into a 55 degree Ellsworth design grind.
I also do not have a bottom bowl gouge yet and plan on getting one.
 
Greg, there are folks here like Bill that are very practiced at knowing and using the subtle differences between grinds, angles, etc. I'm not one of them. I use the same settings for all my bowl gouges and only differ when sharpening my spindle gouges. I decided early on to pick a grind and angle, learn to use it, get comfortable with it and not get lost in the cycle of a different grind will improve my ability to turn. Not saying you are but, just a tip on my experience. I decided predictability was more important for where I'm at. Maybe someday I'll have different grinds for different purposes. I did learn that for me, U shaped flutes are much easier to manage in the bottom of bowls and to sharpen so I have a couple of those I use.
 
Greg Carles said:
to investigate further into a 55 degree Ellsworth design grind.
I also do not have a bottom bowl gouge yet and plan on getting one.
Click to expand...
I would urge you to stick with what you were taught for a while.
Trying new techniques before you have mastered one doesn’t work well for most new turners

I use the Ellsworth most of the time. It is a terrific grind for NE bowls and I don’t need a BoB gouge for open bowls
After you get proficient with the grind you are using try it or take a class with someone who teaches it.
 
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Not sure if this has been mentioned but its related to Lou Jacobs comment. That shape of bowl, especially the interior is difficult for turners regardless of their experience. You didn't mention anything about what kind tool rest you are using. But without some kind of curved or J shaped rest it's going to be hard to make the deep side cuts and the bottom cuts without having too much tool hanging over the tool rest. Your 3/8" bowl gouge is pretty light duty for a deep bowl like you're turning unless you have a rest that will closely follow the contour of your bowl. And even with a heavier gouge its not real easy. But even then it can be very awkward to stay close and ride the bevel. When you stray from that, the wood quickly wins that wrestling match. Aesthetically and for better results for your efforts you might want to consider the shape of bowl you're turning. One nice smooth flowing curve through the bottom with no breaks or changes in the curve are easier to turn, sand, and look more pleasing in my experience.
 
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