Been awhile, and it shows

I have been neglecting my lathe because of shoulder surgery but am getting back into it. Currently working on two kitchen utensil holders made from Bradford Pear. Lots of end grain hollowing. Last fall someone dropped off a section of log about 24 inch diameter and 4 ft. long. It was white wood and I immediately thought it was tupelo. The bowl blanks have dried and I finished a couple. I instantly knew it was not tupelo, but magnolia, from the white and grey coloring of the dried wood.

My Uncle Dave Hunt would have turned cowboy hats out of that ! We have three or so here and they are something else. Beautiful.

Martin

Martin E wrote in news:DhQPA.95213$ep6.10677 @fx07.iad:

That sounds neat! Do the rims curve or are they straight?

Puckdropper

We had a guy in the woodturner's club I used to attend, who turned cowboy h ats out of cherry. Turning the hat is not so amazing. Oh, its a skill tes t, but several folks can do that. But this guy was demonstrating the turni ng of a hat, with the light behind the work piece to judge thickness, and w hen he finished, he had burned in a band on the hat and had a turned up bri m.

But that was not the amazing thing. We are sitting there watching him and the light, through the wood is getting brighter, but he is not watching the hat, he is looking at us, as he is pulling shaving and giving the patter f or the demonstrating.

Now, THAT, is a wood turner.

You turn the hat Green and shape the rim as it dries. The hats fit the head within a felt thickness - just fine - Company with the jigs had specific calculations. Nice is the ones we have are all different wood and look unique between each other.

I think heat was used in the rim bending into a form.

Martin

great idea

have found that turning a resin and wood piece can be tricky as the resistance to the gouge differs between the materials

want to test out if higher rpm makes it better or worse

very true

in texas they call them hats hahaha

i guess they may be as comfortable as wooden shoes

think i have some of this

is it slightly oily wood

this stuff i have feels like it is oily

interesting wood

I started turning seriously again last year after a 15 year break during which my profession took all my time. I know what to do but it's like a musician practising scales - one must, as you say, practise to keep one's skills up to par. This was emphasised to me a couple of weeks ago. I was making a deep hollow turning through a small hole to make a small urn. I managed to get a fairly uniform thickness of 2-3mm and was refining the outside near the base. I had re-ground the fingernail on a 3/8" spindle gouge and almost immediately got a nasty catch. So as I had enough wood left, I tried to turn it out whereupon I caught an even nastier one that consigned the piece of burl to the firewood box. Graham

Little different. Your feet bend and twist and turn when walking or even standing. They are kind of like your hands. They bend and twist in all shapes. Your head stays about the same exact shape all the time no matter how you twist and turn your head.

there are some good videos of a japanese turner doing thin walled bowls and the light bulb technique

the technique used is scraping rather than a full frontal gouge

That makes a lot of sense. However, thus guy was wsung a full blown doufe.

I said he is good. :-)