Segmented Bowl

[Marmotjr]

Waiting for my new tail stock Jam chuck to arrive, should be here tomorrow.  The wooden cone I'm using as a compression chuck is a little sketchy when working the outer rings, it shifts and vibrates more than I'm comfortable with, and it blocks the very edge, so I need a new chuck that will hold from the inside. 

In the meantime, I cleaned out a good portion of the veneer sheets in the inside.

 

 

[Marmotjr]

Woo, it finally arrived.   My specialized Tail Stock Jam Chuck:

(Yes, it's a giant tennis ball.   And when it arrived last night, it was un-inflated.  Had to go to walmart to get a needle for the air pump.  Wally world had these for 2 dollars cheaper )

And here it is in use:

 

I learned this trick for goblets using a regular sized tennis ball from Mike Waldt.  I do have to use the pen mandrel tail stock live center, or else the 60 degree live center would poke a hole in it. 

Now to put this prolonged project out of it's misery. 

 

 

[shaneymack]

I haven't seen this journal before ! Its awesome. Im a total turning newb. Great tip with the giant tennis ball. I turned one bowl in my life and realised half way through that I didn't know how to turn it back around to finish the bottom part. That was the end of my bowl turning career. Lol. Really nice bowl, you are doing a fine job sir !

 

Sent from my SM-N910W8 using Tapatalk

 

 

[Marmotjr]

The key to finishing the bottom of the bowl is two fold:  One, realize it's the bottom, and therefore the least visible part, so a marginal finish on the bottom is acceptable, at least early on, and Two, the bottom is the first thing you finish, and the first part you turn.    Cut your tenon or mortise (are you an innie or an outie?), and sand to finish grit.  Then mount it on the chuck and finish the rest.  Or you can invest/make a Longworth, Donut, or vacuum chuck to turn your piece back over at the end to really finish it. 

[Marmotjr]

Outside sanded to 220, wetted down lightly to see the grain better, and to raise the grain some, when it dries, I'll hit again with 220.    I didn't plan on the Ogee to look that pronounced on the base, but I saw the base was "unbalanced" with the thicker segment, so I burned a groove into it with a wire, and that looked horrible, so I carved it out, and now I like the shape even better.  

[Marmotjr]

Inside is coming along nicely.  Surprisingly, well maybe not, the bowl gouge is a lot less violent and more effective than the carbide tool.  Using almost a side facing scraping cut, maybe 5-10 degrees above that to get some cutting action, but reducing the chance of a catch.   It pushes and pulls quite nicely across the face.  Still some flat spots on the segments to go, but it'll get there.   Not happy at all with the way the plug turned out.  The off centerness of it, and the color makes it quite bleh. 

[Marmotjr]

Totally forgot about the huge gaps in the base segments, so I sat down with my ROS and a chunk of the leftover walnut stock from cutting the base segments.  Sanded it down while I watched a little netflix with the headphones on.  Got the dust bag about 1/4 full of walnut dust.  Mixed that with TB2 glue and patched up the gaps. 

They sanded out nicely.    Then while I was working the inside, I noticed this red color in the veneer.  I thought it was some cool ray flecks in the grain, but it's just the light shining through.  Guess that wall is thin enough then.   Turned and sanded the upper part to the same thickness.

Inside sanded to 220. That plug is really starting to bug me. 

 

And then I had to sand the outside a third time.  I sneezed while wearing my respirator, and I watched a huge glob fly out of the valve and right onto the bowl.  I wiped it off, but it left a stain, even after it had dried.   Sigh.     And I have to wash out the respirator now too.   .  But it sanded out nicely. 

 

But all these are minor issues, except for the plug, which is sorta hidden, so it's not major, but all these issues aside, I'm really happy the way this is turning out.  This will be a really nice piece to show off. 

 

[Marmotjr]

Man, I love shellac.  I don't use this stuff enough.  Already has a nice shine to it. 

That's after 2 coats of 1lb dewaxed, and 2 of 2lb.  I'll probably do another 8-10 coats of 2lb, to build up a nice layer, sanding with 600 grit paper every couple coats.   Then, when that's all done, I'll use my polishing pads to 'sand' it to 12000 grit, and polish it with Shellawax cream. 

[Marmotjr]

So there's now a line of shellac up my pegboard, across the floor, up my chest, and over my face.   Just as I round the top edge of the bowl with the linen wad, a run starts to form,  I usually can get it in time, but this time I didn't.  Launched a spray of shellac all over the place.   Luckily I wear glasses, but I'm pretty sure my eyebrows are gonna be crusty for a while. 

Gotta love woodturning, when you drop something, you're never sure where it will go. 

[shaneymack]

Looks amazing !! Post bunch of pics when you are done with the final coat

 

Sent from my SM-N910W8 using Tapatalk

 

 

[pkinneb]

Marmotjr thanks for the journal the bowl looks great! One question on the jam chuck can you post a pic or two showing what you are using as a tail stock that isn't popping that ball? That's a great idea I want to steel

[Marmotjr]

10 hours ago, pkinneb said:

Marmotjr thanks for the journal the bowl looks great! One question on the jam chuck can you post a pic or two showing what you are using as a tail stock that isn't popping that ball? That's a great idea I want to steel

It's a "mandrel Saver" live center, used for pen mandrels.

 

If you are going to invest in one, you might as well pick up the entire mandrel kit, that will get you 90% of the way to turning pens.  If you have no interest in pen turning, then I'd look for a cupped style live center, as it will hold the ball better.

[Marmotjr]

10-12 Coats of 2lb shellac applied (I honestly lost count).  If after this many coats, the pores aren't completely filled, it'll just have to do.  If I had enough CA, I'd do a couple coats of that to over coat the whole thing, but that's a lot of CA I don't plan on buying.   That would fill the pores nicely, and with polishing, give a glass like appearance to it. 

Sanded down to 12,000 grit, prior to shellawax polish cream:

The lighting in my shop on the lathe doesn't lend towards good photos.  The work lamp is a yellowish bulb, and the fill light is daylight balanced, so it gives a weird mix.  The final photos will be better staged. 

[Marmotjr]

[Marmotjr]

After action report:

Things I learned:

1) Give up trying to save material when laying the horizontal veneer.  Pre-laminating the segments before cutting them makes for pure agony while trying to maintain the proper thickness, and still have it flat.  The wonkiness of gluing up the segments does not lead to proper alignment, and the drum sander will chew them right off.  Possibly using a fly cutter to cut the veneer into rings might save material, but only if you have rings that will fit easily inside each other, otherwise you'll still end up with the same amount of waste.

2) A giant jam chuck does wonders for your nerves.  Having the confidence to take solid cuts knowing the piece won't wobble is a huge time saver.  Of course the piece can still be launched, but the chances are greatly reduced.  And the chuck makes sure a slight catch won't through it out of true, which saves so much time. 

3) Need more shellac next time, probably another 8-10 coats.  I didn't use that much as is, and shellac goes on so easy, and dries so quickly, that it wouldn't be a burden to hit 16-20 coats.  I was removing too much with the polishing.  I wasn't removing that much, but there wasn't enough there, and the pores are still showing through.  Maybe a few more 1lb coats to help fill those pores would have helped. 

4) Lint free rags!  I cut up an old linen pillow case for the shellac brush, and that worked very well.  Keeping that in an airtight container so it won't harden up to ouch and should be ready to go for the next time I use shellac.  When I went to polish with the shellawax, the shop paper towel I normally use for this shredded and left little fibers on the bowl, necessitating another round of high grit sanding to get them off.  Using another scrap of the pillow case worked.  I ordered a small bag of t shirt rags for this purpose in the future.  (On smaller objects, or large ones at low RPM's, the shop towels work fine for shellawax.  But for it to work properly, you need to spread it around and then buff it off.  As it has a touch of abrasive in it itself, the large radius with high rpm's shredded the towel.  Low rpm's weren't creating enough friction to 'activate' the shellawax).

5) This was actually one of my first times seriously using a glue block.  I was hesitant with the newspaper acting a 'quick release'.  I was scared it might release at speed!  Nope, rock solid, and it popped right off with a couple pops with a chisel.  I can now clean up the glue block's face to use it again. 

6) Need to pay attention to the segment alignment when gluing up.  Whoops. 

Future Considerations:

1) Thinner veneer might look better, and that's something I'll try on a later bowl.  I'll have to really tune in the bandsaw to resaw perfectly, as my DW735 will only go to 1/8".   The drum sander will probably be able to go thinner, but there's a slight offset (< 1/16" thinner on the right side) in mine (it's homemade), so a new drum might be required.  Rotating each piece and double sanding at each thickness will probably help with this. 

2) That damned plug.  Issue is I glue up the base segments, with a bit of a gap in the middle to allow the segments to seat properly.  But this tends to create an off center hole in the middle, which makes it difficult to drill the plug hole dead center in the veneer/segments.  Perhaps I can measure from the segment edges with some calipers to find the exact center, mark that somehow, and then drill the proper hole there.  Then mount the base on a worm screw and true it up and cut the mortise from there.   That will make the hole centered on the segments.  I'll have to design the base ring with a smaller inner hole to make this work, so I'll have to do some test runs. 

3) Other materials as veneer.  Something like black construction paper would have a really cool effect here, but being paper, the bowl would not hold together long term.  Possibly pre staining the veneer to a color would also have a nice effect.  The red look of this as the light shone through looked really neat.  Either making the veneer out of paduak ($$$) or staining some cheap wood to that color would be really neat. 

 

Comments and Criticisms are welcomed and encouraged!   Thanks for following along, I know I rambled and posted a lot of bunk.  I appreciate everyone's contributions along the way. 

[wtnhighlander]

I'd say you did a terrific job, especially for a first stab at segmented turning.

 

If you haven't already, check out Kyle Toth on Youtube. He does a ton of segmented stuff, and you might like the dark veneer he typically uses between segments. I think it is dyed black.

[pkinneb]

17 hours ago, Marmotjr said:

It's a "mandrel Saver" live center, used for pen mandrels.

 

If you are going to invest in one, you might as well pick up the entire mandrel kit, that will get you 90% of the way to turning pens.  If you have no interest in pen turning, then I'd look for a cupped style live center, as it will hold the ball better.

Thanks I'll have to pick one up! I have actually been turning pens for years never had one of those but can see how it would be very helpful. Thanks again

[Marmotjr]

12 hours ago, pkinneb said:

Thanks I'll have to pick one up! I have actually been turning pens for years never had one of those but can see how it would be very helpful. Thanks again

Might as well grab a new mandrel too then!  They come as a set.   You'll be shocked at how out of round your mandrel has probably become, just from the couple times you over tightened the tail stock.  This replaces the brass nut on the end, and relies on the tailstock to tighten down on the material and bushings. 

[Marmotjr]

22 hours ago, wtnhighlander said:

I'd say you did a terrific job, especially for a first stab at segmented turning.

 

If you haven't already, check out Kyle Toth on Youtube. He does a ton of segmented stuff, and you might like the dark veneer he typically uses between segments. I think it is dyed black.

Not my first rodeo with segmented turnings, but my first with the MitreSet jig, and the veneer seperators.  It went very well in the end for how poorly it started.

Yeah, Toth does amazing work.  I know exactly what you are referring to, any idea what that material is?

[Woodenskye]

1 hour ago, Marmotjr said:

  I know exactly what you are referring to, any idea what that material is?

I believe I heard him say that it was maple veneer that is dyed black.  If I remember what video it was, I will post.

 

[Gixxerjoe04]

Looks good, makes me want to do some segmenting and do the brink wall look, I've got some padauk I thought about using.  Toth uses ebony veneer on some and dyed black veneer.  The dyed black veneer def isn't cheap, doing the space between each ring would def use a lot, I thought about just using walnut instead of spending the tons of money on the dyed stuff.

[Marmotjr]

On 5/31/2017 at 9:52 AM, Gixxerjoe04 said:

Looks good, makes me want to do some segmenting and do the brink wall look, I've got some padauk I thought about using.  Toth uses ebony veneer on some and dyed black veneer.  The dyed black veneer def isn't cheap, doing the space between each ring would def use a lot, I thought about just using walnut instead of spending the tons of money on the dyed stuff.

Paduak is great to turn.  It's one of my favorites, got a good smell and is fairly soft, or at least easy to turn.  I haven't had enough to make a full piece from mainly paduak, but I've limited it to accent rings and such, and that red really pops, even as a deep crimson. 

[Bankstick]

Marmotjr, I enjoyed the series of the building and turning of this bowl.  I was entertained by  your description of sneezing into the respirator and shellac coating everything in the vicinity of you and the shop.  Read it to the wife who also enjoyed it.  I have tried to blow dust off a turning while wearing a dust mask and face shield.  Results are disappointing.

[Marmotjr]

7 hours ago, Bankstick said:

Marmotjr, I enjoyed the series of the building and turning of this bowl.  I was entertained by  your description of sneezing into the respirator and shellac coating everything in the vicinity of you and the shop.  Read it to the wife who also enjoyed it.  I have tried to blow dust off a turning while wearing a dust mask and face shield.  Results are disappointing.

I used to work in a sandblasting shop, and when I started, none of the hose had pistols grips on them, and all the guys complained how hard it was to hold onto the higher pressure hose.  So I whipped up a couple pistol grips, just some 1" Ti tube with a bracket on one end to attach a hose clamp to the blasting hose, and then wrapped heavily in shrink wrap for grip.

After a couple years, one of the bracket's welds started to peel off the top, so I took it back over to the Tig welder and tacked it back together real quick.  But now the grip was wrapped in rubber, and the top end caught fire.   I sat there trying to blow it out with my welding mask still down and not figuring out why it wasn't going out!

[Eric.]

Completely missed the ending.  Looks cool.  Lots of work for a little project!  Segmented turning takes real patience.

You did much better with Shellawax than I ever did.  I always ended up with lines and crap...could never get it to work well for me.  I'm not much of a turner though.  Figure my lathe will get a lot more work in 20-30 years when I move slower and wear suspenders.