Bowl Transituation

[Jerry Lear]

I have been turning for awhile but still have trouble on the inside of the bowl on turning onto the transition and across the bottom. I use a side ground bowl gouge with a 60 degree bevel and the heel is relieved.
I know this is end grain but I was hoping someone could give me some pointers to help control the tool when making the transition.
Thanks

[Mack Gambrell]

I'm a new turner,what I see (someone correct me if I'm wrong) The tighter the transition is the harder it is to make the turn you loose bevel contact. On tight transitions I use a conventional bowl gouge (bottom feeder) across the bottom

[Reed Gray]

The transition and the bottom inside of a bowl are the most difficult parts to turn. You are at least half way there with the 60 degree bevel and the ground off heel. I grind off over half of the heel and make the relieved part rounded rather than another flat bevel. Going into and through the transition is all holding the tool steady, and rotating with your body. Going across the bottom is all about moving in a straight line by pushing, and remember to keep the handle angle the same, no wiggling. Some days this works to perfection. When it doesn't, this is where a negative rake scraper or standard scraper work well for smoothing things out. If you start to go up the side, you will get tear out. If you try to clean up near the rim with a standard scraper, "I heard this strange screeching and howling sound, and then my bowl blew up. I prefer a shear scrape for the side walls and the transition, using a scraper with a ) shaped nose at about a 60 to 70 degree shear angle. Cleaner than scrapers or even the NRS in most woods.

I have a bunch of bowl turning videos up on You Tube, type in robo hippy....

robo hippy

[robert baccus]

Have you tried a 75 deg. bottom feeder. A cheap 1/2" deep bowl gouge from BB reground works great.

[John K Jordan]

... and the ground off heel. I grind off over half of the heel and make the relieved part rounded rather than another flat bevel. ...

Chris Ramsey showed how he ground his bowl gouges for the bottom of his cowboy hats and difficult transition with the sides. He rounded the entire heat then ground just a very thin bevel at the edge. The bevel is probably less than 16" wide. This is a 3/8" gouge - I highlighted the bevel in the inset. Sorry for the poor cell phone picture!

366622

Chris grinds his gouges by hand without a jig. I tried it and it's not that difficult.

JKJ

[John Keeton]

Aside from all the good comments on the gouge grind, proper form and a smooth, fair curve will help a lot. Seems a lot of folks with transition issues have an abrupt change in curvature on the inside.

[Thomas Canfield]

A Bill Grumbine video I saw about 10 years back suggested lowering the handle as you go into the transition area so that you are cutting above the tool rest/centerline to allow the bevel to remain in contact. That will give you a little more range on the transition. There is the problem of a long handle and small lathe does not allow very much change, and I have a 3/8" Thompson gouge with 8" handle for that purpose on smaller pieces and also for undercutting at the rim.