We were looking at redoing one of our bathrooms with a vessel \ basin type sink. The sink alone can get pretty expensive ($1000)+. I have had several people tell me that I should try to make one -- you can make a lot of mistakes before they add up to $1000+. I have made several bowls (not
14-16" ones though) and it is basically the same idea so I thought I would give it a try (using walnut with maple accents).
Has anyone tried to make a sink out of wood? What type of finish would you put on a bowl that is going to be a sink? I think you would need something a bit more rugged than just a normal "salad" bowl type finish.
Darren wrote: (clip) What type of finish would you put on a bowl that is going to be a sink? (clip) ^^^^^^^^^^^^ I think your best bet would be fibreglass, similar to the stuff used on boat hulls, for example. (Clear, not pigmented, of course.)
I know of a few turners that have turned a cover for under the normal sink bowl to match a cabinet but not the actual sink. I think a thin-type epoxy like used on some tables would work well. Make it a thin layer and get it as smooth as possible. That's going to be the tough part. This way, the beauty of the wood should show through but yet be protected. Not sure how the wood would react to the extremes of temperature of a sink though. Then you've got to be sure you seal the drain REALLY well or it won't last long at all.
Leo, You fell into a common pitfall. Fiberglass is just that, glass fibers in some form or another. It is also the stuff used to insulate houses. I doubt if you are talking about sealing his sink with pink insulation. ;) Fiberglass composite material is fiberglass and resin, usually either polyester, vinylester or epoxy. It is the resins that do the sealing. Dan
Yeah - that is a good point about sealing it because if I don't, it will rot out. My thought on that was to drill the necessary size hold and actually "finish" inside the hole as well so seal it off (sounds like some kind of epoxy is the way to go). Then I will need to put a seal around the drain part as well. I would say that is enough ... maybe I am overlooking something.
Any opinions on which of these would be best? Just the Clear Coat Epoxy Finish?
I'd seal both sides of the bowl. Prevent, as much as possible, any water from reaching the wood. Even dry wood will warp if moisture is introduced to one side.
I'm certainly no epoxy expert but I have used that System Three Clear Coat before on some tables and bar tops. For myself, if I could get that product as thin as possible (while still protecting of course) and very smooth (not sure how you're going to do that in this application) then it would be quite good. Nice and clear. I wouldn't want a really "heavy" epoxy coating on this application. I'm not sure what specific epoxy coating would be better though. There might be one.
As long as you're careful with the epoxy coating around the drain and then the sealing of the fixtures in that drain (plumbers putty is the norm) without scratching your finish, you should be good. Hopefully, you won't get much expansion/contraction of that hole over time. Make darn sure your bowl is dry (but not too dry) to start with before you finish it. Best to finish the entire bowl to help that, if for no other reason.
You've got an interesting project there. I'm interested in how it turns out,
I'd probably use West System's #105 resin and #207 hardener. The results are a nearly colorless, clear coating with minimal (undetectable) blush. I've used it to coat various parts on boats over the years with superb results. Five to seven thin coats, sanded in between, should do it.
Even the so called "cultured marble" sinks that are pretty much the standard today suffer from hairline fractures around the metal drain, caused by expansion and contraction due to heat. I'd be willing to bet any attempt at a wooden sink would amount to a big "disappointment" just waiting to happen. If you do end up making one, how about updating the group in 5 years, then you can really tell us if it worked or not?
These threads just brings up more and more topics for me ...
"Make darn sure your bowl is dry (but not too dry) to start with before you finish it."
I haven't had any problems in the past. Maybe it is because I buy my lumber from a lumber yard as opposed to cutting something down and waiting for it to dry. That doesn't mean that the lumber yard can't have wet wood, but I haven't had any issues yet.
What % is considered "dry". What is % is too dry?
Growing up on a farm - I knew that you couldn't sell cut wheat until it was under 12%, but that doesn't help me much here. :)
what about using a larger hole, with a big rubber thingy(I think its called a gasket) at the top, but the rest bigger then the pipe so it wouldnt contract on it?
in article aiiRb.297031$ts4.101805@pd7tw3no, James Barley at snipped-for-privacy@xemaps.com wrote on 1/26/04 4:29 PM:
"Dry" is a relative term depending, in this case, on use. You can get the bowl too dry and with the application of your finish (again, depending on what you use as to its effects), the wood will swell. You probably won't see a problem in a salad bowl if your wood (different woods behave differently so this is also a "depends" factor) is within a few percentage points of the environmental conditions. Try shipping a walnut bowl with an oil/wax finish from Miami, FL to Pheonix, AZ (or the reverse) and see what happens though. You WILL notice it if you're fitting your wood against an object with differing reactions to moisture, temperature, etc. such as a metal or even some widely differing woods.
A more common problem along these lines is that of making a wooden bushing for your grinding wheel. If you get the tolerances too tight and make a significant change in environmental moisture such as moving to another location then the wood might swell or contract enough to cause problems in vibration, etc.
An understanding of how wood behaves is nice to have when you start messing with lots of different uses for it. A piece of wood is "dry" when it's moisture content is in equilibrium with the environmental moisture content. The environmental moisture content is different in different parts of the world and is (mostly) changing all of the time.
BTW, I grew up on a farm and now own 2 of them. Your analogy about selling wheat at a certain moisture content doesn't help EXCEPT
1) a little earlier in the scenario.... You have to have your wheat growing in the right conditions ... not too dry or too wet or else you don't get the intended results.
2) and you didn't want to sell your wheat when it was too dry either .... in those conditions where you sold by weight (at least for me and corn) ... a too dry load will loose you money!
^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I guess I did, Dan, but I hope that does not obscure the intent of my post. The composite material I had in mind is glass cloth and resin, such as used to build boat hulls, cover wooden hulls, build laboratory sinks, and Corvette car bodies. The glass cloth and resin have the same index of refraction when cured, so the fibres do not show at all, but they impart great strength to the material.
Why not turn a big bowl and use it as a mold/template/mandrel/form/whatever for a spun copper sink? Might be kinda interesting getting into some metal spinning...
This is essentially true, if one uses very light glass cloth, e.g.--3oz. or less. And that can be hard to find. It is also not an easy proposition to cut cloth to fit inside a bowl, but it can be done with painstaking care. The result would be, as you say, strong and attractive.
Dry is a relative term in more ways than one. The construction is important as well. If you cross-laminate, you might exceed the elasticity of your glue with moisture changes. In this case, with a relatively thin section, and stack lamination, the whole construction should move almost as a unit. Which means it should be mounted to the counter with a fixed point on only one long grain area, with the rest restrained only vertically, floating like a tabletop. As long as all the pieces begin close to the same MC point, doesn't matter if that point is 12 or 5%.
There are commercial versions of such sinks. Have you checked their propaganda?
Leo, What you meant to say was to make the bowl FRP lined. You are right about the glass cloth disappearing when wetted with resin, but ONLY if the resin is epoxy. It doesn't do this with polyester. Wood boat makers have been using this trick for years. A single layer of 4 ounce cloth would sheild the wood from damage, especially from impact. Dan
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