Bowl Depth Gage

[Bernie Weishapl]

Well got off work early tonight and watched Bill's video Beyond the Basic Bowl. Decided to go out and out of some scraps under the bench decided to make a bowl depth gage. As Bill says the age old question is where is the bottom of the bowl. So here is my version of his gage. It is actually pretty accurate. Little plywood and couple of dowels.

[Mark Pruitt]

I've thought many times about making one of those. I used Bill's when I was at his place last year. Very nice tool to have on hand.

[Doug M Jones]

Bernie,
I'll show my ignorance... how does it work? (Heck, I do that all the time around here) Is the lower rod the same length as the distance between the upper vertical rod and the end of the large dowel?

[Bernie Weishapl]

Doug PM sent.

[Mike Lipke]

Hey, PM me too!
That's the same question I have after staring at that photo for the longest time.

How does it work?

[Mike Vickery]

I have almost the same thing but I use a laser pointer on the top instead of a stick. Very fast and very accurate. I have been meaning topost a picture for a couple months now but have been to lazy. Great job on yours.

[Patrick Taylor]

If it's like the ones I've used, the dowel slides parallel to the ways, and you put the plywood on the rim with the dowel at the bottom. Then, without sliding the dowel, put the plywood against the rim with the dowel on the OUTside as a reference to compare to the position of the foot.


My mentor has a great one that's just a thin metal rod with a snug sliding fit through a piece of wood.

[Kevin McPeek]

Bernie, when I first looked at it I was thinking, "why the heck does he have a PVC pipe attached to the top of it." Then I clicked on it and saw what was going on.

The one Mike made is pretty slick, theres not very much moving stuff around. With the laser pointed at the end of the dowell you just slide the whole thing into the bowl and when the dowell hits the bottom the laser is hitting the outside so you can see how thick it is.
I admit, when I stop being lazy I'm going to copy it.

[Steve Trauthwein]

Bernie,

Thanks for sharing. I am still a little sore from cutting up a huge box elder the other day and this looks like a good project to recuperate with.

Regards, Steve

[Keith Burns]

Great project Bernie ! Mine is a flat board with a dowel. Not very accurate

[Ken LaSota]

Bernie I have a side question. How do you keep the shaving out of your tool rack?
Ken

[Tom Sherman]

Cool Bernie, looks just like Bill's