Mesquite bowl

[Mike Vickery]

This is a piece of Mesquite that a buffed out today.
It is 10 1/4 by 3 3/4 finished with Watco danish oil and buffed out.
75900
I have been playing with getting a bit thinner on my turnings and this one measures .15 at the rim and is a little thinner through the rest of the bowl.

One note I was guessing the rim was about a 1/4 but I think since I angled it down quite a bit it makes it seem bigger. Does that make sense to anyone.

Comments and critiques are appreciated.

[Alex Elias]

I like the shape you came up with. Very elegant. Funny thing I started to pay attention to is that this kind of bolws look taller than what they really are. Your for instance looks taller than shy of 4". Also I the only thong I've turned so far is pens and mini boxes.
Congrats.
Alex

[Greg Just]

Very nice bowl - love the shape

[robert hainstock]

Nice work Mike. thinner is always a crap shoot. I still use the thumb forefinger (STOP the TURNING first) test and hope I can rech bottom. I usually wind up with too much borrom. Very Good.
:)

[Mike A. Smith]

VERY nice form as always Mike! .15 is getting in the scary side of thin for me.

[Paul Engle]

Very good Mike , how much does it weigh? My turnin buddy at work challenged me to get it in grams for a 4 x 10 bowl, ha ya right....maybe in balsa wood .... give it a shot Mike ... .15 pretty thin .125 is an eight of an inch and yours is just over that by just under a half a 1/32" , was ya getting nervous? ;). Nice work indeed .:D

[Steve Schlumpf]

Very nice looking bowl Mike! Great form and finish! Any reason why you wanted to turn this one so thin? I've turned thin (at least for me) and have found that I actually like the weight and feel of the bowls I make with a little more 'meat' to them.

Nice work Mike - beautiful bowl!

[Kevin McPeek]

Looks great. I'll agree the shape does make it appear to be taller. It has a very crisp line at the rim, it gives it a very modern feel (to me). The figure shows up nicely in that one, I know mesquite tries to hide it a lot of times.

Was there any flexing issues? Seems like when ever I try to go thin, things start flexing and I get some wavy gravy surface going in. I'm too cheap to buy and too lazy to build a bowl steady, so I just leave a little more meat on them.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Great looking bowl Mike. Gotta love mesquite. Well done.

[Allen Neighbors]

Nice work, Mike. Thin is in... Thick is in... Medium is in... I guess what I'm trying to say is whatever works for you is fine with most of us. :) I can't get anything that thin without ulcers, so I don't try. :)
It is a very elegant form. Mesquite is pretty doggone stable, so you needn't worry about anything with this one. Beautiful job!

[Andy Blackwell]

Excellent work Mike. Love that form. It looks like it's begging to be caressed.

[Tom Sherman]

Way to go Mike that one is thin for sure. Looks very good.

[Richard Madison]

Very nice smoothly continuous curvature, but where's the FOOT? Just kidding.

[Christopher K. Hartley]

Nice form there Mike, I really like it. Keep at it man! Keep getting thin and you can do some lampshades.:)

[Henry C. Gernhardt, III]

Nice looking bowl, Mike.

The effect of a wider rim because of the angling makes perfect sense to me. Now, for the ultimate question:

When you measured the thickness of the rim, did you measure it perpendicular to the rotational axis of the bowl, or perpendicular to the tangent of the rim at the point of measurement? You may be able to say it's even thinner than 0.15in... :)

[George Guadiane]

That is a very nice piece of wood, put to WONDERFUL use!
Nice finish too.

[Glenn Hodges]

You and the wood have really impressed me. Be careful turning them this thin someone might mistake it for a potato chip or the wind might blow it away at a picnic....I do like it.

[Ed Scolforo]

Mike, beautiful piece and one of my favorite forms. Well done.

[Mike Vickery]

Thanks everyone I appreciate the feedback. I forgot to mention this piece was not turned wet, this was from a dry rough out. Usually most of my really thin stuff has been small and turned wet using a light to gauge how thin it is. With dry Mesquite the light does not work.

Hopefully I dont miss anything here

Paul Engle - Paul I would love to be able to weigh it but I do not have any small scales that I could use. I will PM you if I do get a weight. I have gone thinner before but only on really small pieces

Kevin McPeek - The figure only showed on one side unfortunately. Yeah it was flexing. I just use my hand on the outside as a steady and turn thin in small sections, the only really hard part is where you join the two sections together.

Steve Schlumpf - I agree with you in general Steve about the weight of thin walled pieces. When you turn thin it is usually more to impress other turners then for customers. I don't sell very much so I just turn to amuse myself and don't have to worry if anyone but me likes it. I have been trying to push myself out of my comfort range both in shape and skill level, so I did this as a challenge to myself.

Allen Neighbors - I am with you completely I turn them thin, thick, medium, footed, unfooted, textured, colored or what ever I am in the mood for. I work with mesquite a lot and know how stable it is but this one was actually form a dry rough out.

Henry Gernhardt - Glad the rim thing makes sense, kind of like the sharper then angle on your bowl gouge the longer the bevel you will have. I think I measured from the tangent of the rim. I actually rarely measure the wall thickness, I just happened to on this one and was suprised. I would have guessed the rim was about a 1/4 and was shocked when I measured it.