Turning wet vs turning dry

[robo hippy]

Well, if you know me, you know I prefer sloppy wet wood, and the more it warps, the more I like it. So, yesterday, I cut up a nice blank of big leaf maple, which I really don't like to turn because it seems to never cut cleanly, no matter what I do. Well, the cleanest surfaces I could get on it was with a NRS. Now, I do use a NRS across the bottom of a bowl frequently since the grain is fairly straight so there is minimal uphill/downhill. I NEVER go up the sides. I tried shear scraping with mixed results. My gouge skills are okay, but not excellent. I did try a NRS and it seemed to leave the best surface. This is puzzling to me. Now, I do follow Tomislav, and like his methods, and he pretty much always turns dry wood, and his finish cut, most of the time is with a 50 degree scraper. I did ask him once if there was much of a difference when turning wet wood and he replied, not much. I am starting to wonder. With the fresh green wood I turn, with the exception of madrone, I won't use any kind of scraper because it leaves a lot of tear out in the transition and up the sides of the bowl. I do have 5 more of them to turn, and will experiment some more. Still, I do wonder if there is a lot more to green/dry wood than I expected.

Side note, In sanding the big leaf maple, I found the 80 grit cubitron discs to be VERY aggressive, and ended up starting with 120 grit, then 220, then 400. I think the solid surface 80 grit cubitron cuts more like 60 grit. Still, I got 4 bowls sanded in the time it normally takes me to sand 2.

robo hippy

 

[Jamie Straw]

Not sure if there's a question here, but the general topic of wet maple makes me think of what I've been learning about Siri Robinson's approach to spalted maple, apparently a very steep bottom feeder at low lathe speed. A mentor at our club has had multiple discussions with her and used the technique.

 

[Dean Center]

This also raises the question as to whether big leaf maple behaves differently than silver and sugar/rock maple. Our local maples are all landscape trees, many planted 100 years ago. Turned green, there is little difficulty getting clean cuts, unless is highly figured, or on undercut rims.

Reed, since you love scrapers, have you considered trying Richard Raffan's big scraper technique, where he's actually angling the scraper up as he draws it back from bottom through the transition zone? It's probably a shear scrape, though it's hard to see how the edge is applied on the available videos.

 

[John Torchick]

This also raises the question as to whether big leaf maple behaves differently than silver and sugar/rock maple. Our local maples are all landscape trees, many planted 100 years ago. Turned green, there is little difficulty getting clean cuts, unless is highly figured, or on undercut rims.

Reed, since you love scrapers, have you considered trying Richard Raffan's big scraper technique, where he's actually angling the scraper up as he draws it back from bottom through the transition zone? It's probably a shear scrape, though it's hard to see how the edge is applied on the available videos.

Dean- you got my curiosity up. Need to check that video. Have subscribed to RR among others.