Dave Mount did a great job of detailing how he turns spheres. I can not be the only one who tried it. Let's all express our appreciation for Dave's efforts by posting photos of our sphere like round things.
Mine is a 3 inch American Elm sorta round ball.
Elm Sphere.jpg
I used Dave's method to get to the 3D octagon, Rounded off the corners and remounted it to turn the extra wood where it had been mounted. Then I sort of fell into my old habit of just remounting it in many orientations until it looked and felt right. The grain in the original blank ran approximately 20 degrees from the axis, so I really paid little attention to how I was mounting it each time.
In the past I used a method that was posted on the creek several years ago. Turn a cylinder and rough out a sphere staying a little greater than the diameter of your cylinder. Then remount with the original axis vertical and use a parting tool to cut a groove through the middle of your sphere until it just touches the cylinder diameter which is now the horizontal centerline. You now have two circles at 90 degrees to each other that clearly mark out the wood that you need to turn away. I think Dave's method was more accurate and if you are trying for a sphere with a defined diameter much more likely to be successful. Once you get to the octagon for a 3 inch sphere there is really very little wood left to remove and very little chance of making a mistake with Dave's method.
Looking forward to seeing your spheres, balls, or sorta round things.
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Originally Posted by Paul Williams
