My first bowl rough-out.

[Terry Rothwell]

I managed to get through my first rough out tonight and wanted to post a few pictures before I bagged it to dry. It is from a piece of Box Elder with a little spalting and some really cool looking grain. Take it easy on me, this is my first bowl, LOL. Thanks for looking, Terry. 117870

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[Jason Solodow]

Terry-

Beautiful wood! I love box elder, about three years ago I managed to score 4 tons of it, made about 150 bowls out of it. Fun to work with! Shape is excellent, the lines flow well. How thick did you leave the bowl? As a rule, you want to leave the wall thickness 10% of the diameter. I usually leave mine 3/4" to 1 1/4" thick. This leaves plenty of room for warpage and return down the road. The other thing is, it looks like you used an expansion recess for mounting to a chuck. From personal experience, it is harder to true a recess and have it thick enough to support the weight, as opposed to a tenon.

Anywho, it certainly looks better then my first rough out! Good job!

[Terry Rothwell]

Thanks Jason. I did use an expansion recess to chuck it up, I will try the tenon on the next one, Im still in trial and error stage right now. The sides were left at about 3/4" thick and the bottom is around an inch or so. I can see several more bowls in my future as this was a blast. Thanks again, Terry.

[Thomas Canfield]

Terry,

I am a novice at rough turning bowls, but in addition to using a tendon on the bottom (with center mark left) I have found it was good to leave a center nub in the inside with center mark for a live center. I could then remount the blank later between centers and true up the tendon and outside of the bowl before mounting the tendon in a chuck to do the inside. Some expert should give us both some better instructions. I have a number of blanks to rough out and the procedure I plan to follow at this time.

Of course. those with a vacuum chuck have other options.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Terry - this is going to be a great looking bowl once finished! Nice form - great color!

The recess/tenon thing is sort of a personal choice. I started off with a recess but blew out a couple bowls as there was not enough wood left after truing. If your bowl is 1" thick at the bottom you have plenty of wood to still turn a tenon when you go to finish turn it.

Thomas - when I true up my tenon - I open the jaws on my Talon chuck and use it as a jam chuck - meaning the bowl is held in place and under pressure by the tailstock. This allows me to true up the tenon, reshape and sand the outside of the bowl before mounting it in the chuck to finish the inside.

One other point - when roughing out a bowl, or anything, make sure you do not leave any sharp edges as the wood will dry out faster at that location and start to crack. Take a moment or two and gently round everything over.

[alex carey]

Box Elder is great and it looks like you'll have some nice pink in there. Great job. Looking forward to the finished product.

[Bernie Weishapl]

That is going to be a great looking bowl when finished. I agree with Steve on not leaving sharp edges. I round my edges and seems to help keep them from cracking more.

Also I expand my chuck and use it as a jam chuck bringing up the tailstock to true up the tenon. Then reverse putting the tenon in the chuck and finish.

[Thomas Canfield]

Steve / Bernie,

Thanks for the tip on using chuck as jam chuck. I had to give it some thought, but see that it would provide drive even for larger bowl blank with tailstock applying pressure even for the eccentric or oval dried rough turned blank.

[David Gunn]

It definately better than my first try, yours still has the bottom on it. :D:D:D

[Nathan Hawkes]

Great job, Terry! See you over on ArboristSite.