When bowl turning

HI

When bowl turning which woods are the most stable , will not warp or crack as much ? Which are the least stable?

What does everyone think of as pine for a turning wood. I have never turned any pine?

Randy

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Reply to
randyswoodshoop
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Reply to
Ralph E Lindberg

Most bowls tend to be out of hardwoods with a tight grain and nice features.. Some of my favorites are bocote, cocobolo, bloodwood and ironwood, with my absolute favorite being olive..

Least favorites are the ones with open grain, like red oak and lacewood.. Most fruit woods will most likely crack...

IMHO, warping is a GOOD thing.. As long as it's something that I turned thin and finished before it warped..

mac

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Reply to
mac davis

Reply to
Bill Noble

Black walnut is pretty stable. Most maples are good also. Ted

Reply to
Ted

Fruit woods are more inclined to crack and check. Maple, walnut, myrtle, ash, all seem to be pretty stable. My favorite is Pacific Madrone, which is the most difficult to dry that I have come across. Rule of thumb, if you dry it too fast, it will crack, if you dry it too slow, it will mold, which isn't always a bad thing. How you dry it changes a lot depending on your local weather and humidity. You can turn thick, dry it and return it after it is dry, or you can turn it thin (1/4 to 1/2 inch), let it dry and warp, then sand it, which is how I like to do it. I found it a lot easier to let it dry first, but, you need to power sand, and need a lathe which will slow down to the

10 to 20 rpm. Most of the 3 phase, with c> Black walnut is pretty stable.  Most maples are good also.
Reply to
robo hippy

"The biggest thing to help me dry my bowls is to wrap the outside of the bowl with a couple of layers of newspaper, then secure it to the rim with a couple of wraps of the 6 inch plastic film that you use to wrap boxes on a pallet. Put some pressure on it when wrapping. Then cut out the paper on the inside of the bowl. The theory is that inside will dry quicker than the outside, so it shrinks, and pulls the outside in, putting the bowl in sort of a compression mode."

This looks like an interesting (and from what I have seen new) technique so a couple of questions on how to do it since we don't have pictures to work with.

  1. Do you still use the 10% of diameter guideline for the bowl thickness?

  1. Do you wrap the paper vertically or horizontally with plastic assuming the bowl is sitting horizontally like it would sit on a table? If you wrap the bowl vertically it seems you would need to cut the plastic out to get at the paper to cut it out of the inside.

  2. Is it important to cover all of the outside of the bowl including the bottom of the bowl with the plastic?

Thanks ahead of time for the info.

Reply to
TWW

Because of the form of your questions, I will assume you are somewhat new to woodturning, as am I. I have only turned 5 bowls in my whole life. Only one was wet wood; willow. After asking some questions here and getting some good answers, it came out really nice! And, a year later, no cracks at all. But, here's my 2 cents: All the other bowls I have turned have been from one small piece of cherry branch about 7 or 8 inches in diameter and 8 feet long. When I cut that branch off the tree 7 or 8 years ago, I cut it into 2, 4 foot lengths and painted the ends. Forgot about it until mid year, last year. That's when I cut the thing up and made a few bowls. Of the four bowls I turned from this DRY cherry, I have gotten NO splitting or checking or warping at all. The point is: dry wood seems more stable than wet wood, if that's any help to you at all. We have heated with wood for many years and have thousands and thousands of board feet of wood that we have sawed and stored here for as long as 25 years. They tell me that it takes about one year per inch of wood thickness to get it to dry. Using only air drying, here in west central Wisconsin, almost all of my wood stabilizes at real close to 16% moisture. So, even after many years of air drying, when I brought those pieces into the shop, I kept them in a plastic bag, loosely closed, so they wouldn't make the transition from 16% toward 6 or 7% too quickly.

Last point: Dry wood is a lot harder to turn and a lot harder on the lathe tools, but, at least it doesn't squirt "juice" in my face like the wet willow did.

Pete Stanaitis

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randyswoodshoop wrote:

Reply to
spaco

TTW, Actually, the practice of wrapping the bowls this way started 5 or more years ago by the guy who started the DNA (denatured alcohol) soaking method. So, I guess it isn't too new. The DNA is supposed to help in drying and stabilizing wood. From my experiments, it does ablosutely nothing that can be measured. I turn to final thickness (1/4 to 1/2 inch depending on wood), and let the bowls dry and warp then sand. I have never tried the turn thick, then dry, then return method. The soakings, both DNA and LDD might have an effect on the wood when doing this way, but again, I haven't tried it. I have wrapped only the rim, with about an inch of plastic on the inside, and the rest on the outside of the bowl, and it seems to work as well. With the paper, I wrap the entire outside of the bowl, bend it over the rim a bit to hold it in place till I can get the plastic film on to hold it in place. So, I guess I wrap the paper vertically, and the plastic horizontally (around the rim only). I have wrapped the entire outside of the bowl with the plastic, and it works as well. What surprised me was that there was no condensation between the plastic and the wood. Also, because I am putting tension on the plastic as I wrap, when I did the entire outside, the plastic would actually pull itself off the bowl. Paper first, then plastic second seems to be the easiest way. You can save the paper after use and it is already preformed for using again if you have a bowl similar in size.

robo hippy

On Jan 26, 9:34 am, spaco wrote:

Reply to
robo hippy

Kip Powers Rogers, AR

Reply to
kip055

Ted is right black walnut is most stable ....

Reply to
dgoddard83

Black walnut can be very stable. But, fast growing black walnut with thick sapwood tends to shrink, warp and check quite a lot. In my experience, of the different woods that I use, it is probably the most variable as far as shrinkage goes.

Mike

Reply to
mike sbrocca

SHMBO put in a rush order for a bowl for a gift. I had just returned form a chain saw party with our local woodturners group and had a pickup load of Bodark and Mesquite. I turned a natural edge bowl from green Bodark (one day old) to 1/8" thickness and soaked it in alcohol. I only had isopropyl (anhydrous) available so used that. After a night in IPA I air dried it for a few hours and sanded it. It did not warp or crack. I like Bodark for its' ability to buff up to a high sheen with only wax.

Mesquite is not stuff I let my wife give away.

robo hippy

Reply to
Paul Gilbert

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