bowl drying question...

[john davey]

So I have been reading this site for quite a while and have read many ways to turn a green bowl and then dry it. I just watched Scott Phillips tv show American woodworker. He did a green maple bowl. turned it and said friction sanding it was all that was needed to dry it. He then put a finish on it and called it good. Now I am assuming if it was this simple you all would not have the umpteen different methods of doing this so my question simply is, will this work or is Scott going to have a warped bowl on his hands? Thanks, John...

[Faust M. Ruggiero]

John,
His bowl will obey all the laws of nature as it gives up it's moisture. It will shrink radially and not longitudinally in relation to the grain. It can't help itself. That means the bowl will become somewhat oblong. Now, that's really simplifying it. How much it moves will depend on how much moisture was in the original blank, how much of the moisture was given up during turning, and where the bowl blank was taken in the log.
However, all this is not bad. Lots of us like to make "once turned bowls" and enjoy allowing the wood to do it's thing. It's natural that way. As long as he turned the walls thin enough and even the bowl will probably not crack. It may require a bit of time in a paper bag. Then the turner can decide if he wants to level the bottom on sandpaper or just let the bowl rock. It's all good!
faust

[Fred Belknap]

Faust has you pretty well covered. I like my bowls to be round and not wobble. A three legged bowl won't wobble. Thin bowls blow in the wind and appear fragile. Almost all that I do are soaked in DNA and dried before finish turning but it is only because that is what I like and they seem to sell pretty good. Experiment and do what appeals to you. There will be some failures no matter what way you go.

[Sean Hughto]

Like so many things, it all depends.

How wet was the wood to start?
What is the grain like and how is it oriented?
What species is the wood - I doubt he could get away wit this with apple or other woods that crack easily when drying, for example.
How thin did he turn the walls?
How uniform is the thickness throughout.

He can maybe avoid cracking, but the others have said, he will get an oval no matter what.

[john davey]

OK, thanks for the replies. I just thought it was odd that he did not mention movement at all and just acted like it would be fine. TV, who knows. To answer some questions He turned green hard maple. He actually went out in his yard with a chainsaw and cut it from a recently felled tree. He split the log in half and rounded it on the band saw. He put a faceplate on the flat from the split, turned a tenon and flipped and chucked it. Turned it down to what looked like about a half inch. Didn't say bit it didn't look to thin. thanks,John

[Leo Van Der Loo]

I have been turning for better than 50 years, not a production turner, I just love the wood and turning it.

I have always tried to learn the how and what of wood, what to do and what not to do, trying to force mother nature and you’d be on the losing end every time.

Work with and use to your advantage, you can get stunning results or at least good results.

It is how I came up with the use of the brown paper bag, well before the “net” was in vogue, it has always made sense to me to slowly dry wood giving it time to move, and worked perfectly as long as I don’t work against mother nature.

Sometimes I try to get away with things and win, but often enough I’m put in my place and have to admit that I knew I was going out on a limb :)

Here are some pictures from pieces I have turned, just to show that wood does what wood wants to do, and you can predict often what will happen, but not always how much, and than have to cross your fingers for the good end result you hope for, I have turned many bowls over the years, still have close to one thousand rough turned bowls, and probably (almost certainly ;)) will never finish all of them, but I have had fun making them and learned a lot doing it.

This shows how much wood can go oval and when returned like here, you can leave that and get a flat and stable piece.
299178 299179

Here are two Apple bowls and you can see turned thicker or thinner, the wood still will shrink, the thin one is wobbly of course, as it is too thin for a foot.
299180 299181

Again thick or thin they shrink and move, more or less, depending shape and sap and heartwood, but no splitting, when giving the wood the time to move as it dries.
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Here are two were I knew it was going to move and anticipated that, the large Elm I like, the Plum root burl, even though I turned the bowl thin and kept the rim wider, hoping it would help to minimize the warping, the outcome is just overboard, It dried slow and didn’t split open, but the shape is not what I had hoped for :rolleyes:, Oh well I cant win them all :)
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[Pat Scott]

All I'll say is Scott Phillips needs to take some turning lessons! He is NOT the person you want to learn to turn from.

[Reed Gray]

Every wood is different, so there are no set rules for every wood. Add to that, every place has a different environment, so again, no set rules. It is an art. That being said, I prefer to dry the bowls first, then sand them. Much easier to sand dry wood than wet. The more they warp, the more I like them. I start them out on the garage floor, with the rims rounded over and plastic stretch film over the rims. Up on a wire rack after a few days, and dry in 10. But again, that depends....

robo hippy

[Steve Paxman]

Every wood is different, so there are no set rules for every wood. Add to that, every place has a different environment, so again, no set rules. It is an art. That being said, I prefer to dry the bowls first, then sand them. Much easier to sand dry wood than wet. The more they warp, the more I like them. I start them out on the garage floor, with the rims rounded over and plastic stretch film over the rims. Up on a wire rack after a few days, and dry in 10. But again, that depends....

robo hippy

So, you turn them to final thickness first, let them dry for 10 days or so, then re-mount them for sanding and finishing, and that's it? When you remount, do you just jam it against the chuck or something and true up the tenon, then mount it in the chuck, then reverse and jam again to finish the foot and that's that? Or some other method?
And finally, the question every woodturner gets every time they do anything, what's your finish of choice for your bowls, Reed?

[Reed Gray]

Well, for the long version, I have a number of clips up:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7rV_Y9vwoTl18_dSSaffjw

For remounting, I use a chuck with extended jaws that are smaller than my original jaws. I use a recess, and can wiggle it around for a grip that is good enough for sanding, but I wouldn't turn with it. If you use a tenon, you could do some thing similar, but still have to turn the tenon off. You could rig a jam chuck that would be more of a dome to fit into the bottom of the bowl, and use the center point of the tenon (always mark before you reverse to turn the inside). For a finish, I use The Wood Doctor's Walnut oil.

robo hippy

[Frank Hasty]

Far from being a really good turner, I have turned a few green bowls and watched them move, but I'm not a fan of wiggly looking bowls. They do need to be thin in order to prevent cracking, on a good size bowl 12"dia. I would say 3/8" wall and uniform. Leave it overnight and it will move, I have heard that storing it in a barrel of shavings will mitigate movement, but I don't have a barrel. So I let the wood dry first. Log ends are sealed with a wax emulsion sometimes with a layer of parchment paper buried in it. Then inside a couple of large paper bags. I've accumulated a lot of wood over the years so I can afford to wait a year if necessary.

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Far from being a really good turner, I have turned a few green bowls and watched them move, but I'm not a fan of wiggly looking bowls. They do need to be thin in order to prevent cracking, on a good size bowl 12"dia. I would say 3/8" wall and uniform. Leave it overnight and it will move, I have heard that storing it in a barrel of shavings will mitigate movement, but I don't have a barrel. So I let the wood dry first. Log ends are sealed with a wax emulsion sometimes with a layer of parchment paper buried in it. Then inside a couple of large paper bags. I've accumulated a lot of wood over the years so I can afford to wait a year if necessary.

Even if you would be able to dry a log without splitting, never mind the time it would take (not dry in a year that’s for sure), then when you turn the wood it will still warp and move.

Turn it wet and let it dry then return it and it might not move or warp after that :) 299375

[Frank Hasty]

Fortunately I have a lot of wood, most of it from a tree service friend. And it is now all dry, Has been in a shed for a couple of years or in my shop attic. I've turned green wood, but I prefer dry. Strictly a hobbyist, an amateur, give everything I turn to friends. I have stoppers in China and a bowl in Budapest, I'm a lucky fella!

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Fortunately I have a lot of wood, most of it from a tree service friend. And it is now all dry, Has been in a shed for a couple of years or in my shop attic. I've turned green wood, but I prefer dry. Strictly a hobbyist, an amateur, give everything I turn to friends. I have stoppers in China and a bowl in Budapest, I'm a lucky fella!

Nice to know Frank, up here wood looks like this when drying 299995or worse :)