Well, have had my lathe since December now, mastered the old light pull and other items, decided to turn to bowls and hollowing. I don't have too many problems with the outside, but hollowing, whatever tool I use, just seems to dig in. What tools do you recommend for hollowing, say just a small shallow bowl. I have a bowl gouge, several skew chisels, a parting tool and a couple of scrapers (and a couple of roughing out gouges of course)
Assuming the more usual side grain orientation for an open bowl, I'd suggest a bowl gouge. You should grind back the "wings" a bit and you may find drilling a depth hole in the center helpful.
Kip Powers Rogers, AR
Hello Moggy,
The bowl gouge is the preferred tool for hollowing a bowl. Assuming the wood is mounted plankwise on the lathe (i.e., the grain is perpendicular to the axis of rotation), you should cut with the bowl gouge toward the middle of the bowl. Drill a hole to approximate depth of the bowl. Then start back and inch or so and cut toward the hole you've drilled with the tool cutting slightly above center and the flute pointing to about 1:00 o'clock. Cut down toward the center. Move back and out about 1/4 inch and make another cut toward center. Each pass should take you a bit deeper and closer to the outside of the bowl. When you get to the bottom of the hole you drilled, check your wall thickness for evenness and thinness. Calipers do a nice job, but the thumb and forefinger also works quite well.
Use a round nose scraper to take light cuts and removed any ridges left by the gouge.
If the grain is running parallel to the axis of rotation. You reverse this process and cut from the center hole up toward about 10:00 o'clock with the flute pointed in the direction of cut. This is sort of a scooping cut and as you get deeper you'll get closer to the outside. Again use a scraper to lightly cut and remove the ridges left by the gouge.
You'll likely get a dozen more ways to do this and they will all be right if they work. There is no wrong way to do things, only ways that don't work for you.
Fred Holder
I'll press again for keeping things supported between centers until you're almost done.
Hello Fred or any other that cares to chime in,
I've been learning to turn since last October. What I would like to understand is the theory/mechanics of end turning. When making a bowl with the grain running perpendicular to the axis of the lathe I start at the outside of the blank and work towards the middle and all works rather well. What I don't understand is why one would, with end grain turning, start in the middle and work towards the outside. I would assume that it has something to do with the orientation of the wood fibers, i.e., cutting from the middle to the outside means that the fibers one is cutting are supported by those next in line to be cut. (Apologies here if my description is garbled or unclear). If the fiber-support assumption is correct, then why, couldn't one start at the outside on end grain turning and cut to the middle? It seems that in both cases adjacent fibers support those being cut until the very end of the cut. I do keep my bowl gouge sharpened but it does seem that end grain turning is much more work intensive than cross-grain turning. Thanks,
-Kevin
Hello Kevin,
I'm not sure I can explain why it works best to cut from the center of a piece of endgrain out toward the outside edge. It does have to do with the way the fibers are arranged and it has to do with the way that the wood likes to be cut. Cutting from the outside toward the center on an endgrain bowl can be done with a very sharp chisel; however, it is also very easy to get a hugh catch that will actually tear the wood from the lathe. The wood seems to like to be cut from center to the outside on the endgrain. I believe in cutting the way the wood wants to be cut is best.
Fred Holder
Center out tends to keep the piece centered better, in my opinion. That said, I often hollow (just finished a couple of goblets before lunch) on the plunge and sweep method, where I cut out from center running up to the rim, then back to center and down into the piece, reversing until I have an approximate dimension. Key is to keep the gouge referenced solidly to the surface being peeled, and have the rest either high or low to support a skewed angle to the cut. Take a peek at a cross-grain version of the method at
the stuff that I have been attempting so far is froma a slice through a log (still trying to work out in my mind which way that leaves the end grain) the middle I don't have a problem with, the dig in is always when I am at the edge of the bowl.
If you slice the log across and come up with a "round" slice then the end grain is across that slice from bark to bark. If you cut into the log and take a slice down the length then you are not cutting end grain if you turn into the face of that slice.
With an end grain bowl or goblet, when you are starting to hollow out, first take a parting tool or a skew and establish the width of the rim. Decide how wide the thikckess of the rim will be and push the tip of the tool into the wood, resulting in a groove from a quarter to half an inch deep. Then work to that established edge with your bowl gouge to hollow out the middle. When you get to the final shaping and hollowing of the wall to that edge use your scraper held firmly on the tool rest at an angle to make a shearing cut (so that too much grain will not be torn).
I use a tool called a termite from OneWay for hollowing end grain. It is a ring tool with different size tips. There had been a lot of discussion of this tool on this group a long while back. Search the archive through google and you will find threads about it. This tool makes working end grain a lot easier with less catches - if you use it correctly,
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