From Board to Bowl

We'll be having a demonstrator do exactly that at our turning symposium this year:

Roy I have not done this for ages but here goes some suggestions:

1) draw out the bowl in cross section 2) separate the drawing horizontally with lines the thickness of the board i.e. if the board is 3/4" thick, draw lines 3/4" apart 3) determine if the baord is possible as the part must align the top outside of the lower ring with the bottom inside of the upper ring (draw it, this should make sense) 4) adjust drawing to fit 5) remember to leave the walls thick enough to turn 6) cut out the bowl circle from a board and mount to a glue block 7) true up disk 8) part from outer ring in being careful of angles (it helps to draw them on the tool rest) 9) glue up rings. 10 ) turn, sand and finish

I think Kevin Neely has a site showing a jig for gluing the rings on a laminated bowl. It will work well for this application as well. Using two boards allows for a lot more variation in design.

I have not thought of this in a long time. If I get the chance (not likely for a while) I will set up a turorial page.

Very. That's the whole point of the tool you're not buying. But you can likely rig a way to get the angle right without it. Make a drawing - the bottom of one needs to glue to the top of the next - if the angle is wrong, they won't fit together.

Bad idea. Middle ones can slip out. Glue one at a time.

You're basically replicating it freehand. Note that this technique severely limits the bowl forms you can make. Segmenting gives you a lot more freedom of design when starting from boards.

I have done this with plywood, makes for an interesting bowl.

I do miss GNHW and the turning symposium. Nice to see that it is going so well.

Owen Davies

Well, there is an airport in Manchester, you could always fly up for the symposium ;-)

Yeah, we're in pretty good shape these days. In fact, some of our subgroups are outgrowing their meeting spaces. Our newsletter keeps growing, and we're starting to get far-away members who, I think, join just for the newsletter.

Look up True Economy: a bowl from a board Please response if that is what you are looking for or not

YRM

"Roy Fek" skrev i melding news: snipped-for-privacy@u72g2000cwu.googlegroups.com...

It seems like a heck of a lot of work. Is there something to the resultant piece that makes it worth the extra effort, compared to turning from a massive blank?

BjarteR

Sounds like Roy needs to learn to turn green wood. I agree, its hard to find bowl-sized blanks in dry wood, but gluing up rings is not the way to go, in my opinion.

Why? Because the end result looks like you glued a bunch of rings together to make a bowl because you couldn't find a piece of solid wood that was big enough. Just my opinion. Layered bowl guys, go ahead and smack me with a dead carp. :-)

Barry

To me the end result is not worth the effort, but it's one way to keep busy and maybe out of trouble ???? Roy went to Wood Central but he got about the same answers, to his question, so we are not the only ones to not get very exited for making a bowl from a plank.

Have fun and take care Leo Van Der Loo

==========================

At the risk of being branded a turning heretic, the problem you're trying to solve can be easily done with a scroll saw. Draw the outline of the form you want; make sure the form can be done within the thickness of the stock you have at hand. The cut angle you need may vary as the form changes from bottom to top, but this is adjusted by changing the tilt of the saw table. You'll also need a drill press to match the start holes for the scroller. There is a limit to the forms that can be created from one piece of board, but if you want to use more than one piece of board per bowl, then your possibilities are greatly expanded, plus some veneer can enhance the overall effect. Does this mean I have to send myRCW membership card back?? (:-)

Ken Moon Webberville, TX.

You can even scroll the spiral if you like. I believe I've seen that one dolled up on a lathe. If you decide to splurge and use _two_ boards, you can certainly increase your design options.

Did the first of my extremely limited number of built-up turnings with two boards and a trammel-mounted router. Did some segment stuff, too, but never really warmed to the idea. Then I read an article in FWW about turning green wood, something I could get in abundance even exceeding boards. Been doing it ever since.

Now _staved_ turning is another matter.

To all the nay sayers I would suggest reading Malcolm Tibbett's new book. He has gone a long way with a bowl from a board and some of his design alternatives are nothing but brilliant! Personally I am NOT a fan of anything segmented but this guy is surely on a level that most of us can only dream about. Here's a link so you can check out "Three bowls" which were done with band sawn rings,

"Peter Hyde" skrev i melding news:nopeter.hydespam-

Now, _this_ makes sense, but somehow I believe that the reason for using bandsawn rings in this case is somewhat different from a lack of a big enough blank:-)

BjarteR

Hello Roy,

There have been a lot of good responses to your post so I will not duplicate any of them. One thing that I did not notice anyone mentioning was the use of a backing board when cutting the rings. The ringmaster cuts in from the back and then from the front. With a parting tool you can not cut in from the back. Without a backing board, there is a tendency for the rings to have tear out when the parting tool cuts through the back side. A backing board eliminates this problem reasonably well.

I've had the cutting guides from Craft Supplies Ltd. in the UK for many years, I think it is called the Marrison System or something like that. They recommended the use of a 1/8" wide Bedan to do the cutting. It worked fairly well. They, however, did not mention the use of a backing board, which I have found to be crucial.

I recently saw a demonstration at the Seattle chapter of AAW by Jack Wayne on this type of bowl making. Jack used a thin parting tool with fluting that gave you two leading points for the cutting. He also used a backing board and did his cutting from outside edge toward the center. It worked very well.

Fred Holder

I saw a lot interesting comments but I didn't see anyone who uses my approach. I do a lot of segmented bowls but some natural also. As regards the segmented bowls, my approach is to start with a board that is 1/2 the final desired width of the bowl. I then use my compound miter saw to cut a series of triangles which when glued together provide a single layer. Sometimes I do a 15 degree angle (12 segments) or a 30 degree angle (6 segments). I then cut each layer into circle with the band saw. depending on the size of the layer, I use a saber saw to cut out the center which provides an additional smaller layer for a top layer or a smaller additional bowl. Prior to gluing the rings together I sand them with a thickness sander I built for my Shopsmith. Of course you can mix and match woods and colors or make the entire glue-up from the same type of wood. One of the main advantages to this is that you never have to deal with end grain (provided of course that you align the triangles properly before gluing).