This post is in response to Arch's response to the thread "Foreward/Reverse Options? Why?
"Not knowing any better, I find that reverse sanding can be useful when sanding stringy wood or removing burnish marks. Some things 'seem' to work for me that science insists can't, so I just keep on 'doing it wrong' til science catches up. :)
I bet I'm not the only woodturner who not knowing any better, does things that can't work. "
Until the advent of high speed filming, the bumble bee wasn't supposed to be able to fly. The wings just weren't large enough to provide enough lift given the mass of the bumble bee. All the "known" rules of aerodynamics "proved" it couldn't fly - yet bumble bees did in fact fly. "Known" is the key word here.
When filmed with a high speed movie camera, the reason the bumble bee COULD, in fact, fly became obvious. The assumption had been that the wings could only provide lift on the "down stroke". WRONG! Turns out the wings can change their orientation to get lift on both the down stroke and the "up stroke" - almost doubling their "lift" capabilities.
When I was teaching lost wax casting of jewelry and small sculpture I'd occassionally get a student who did something every thing I'd read and seen and everything that I "knew" - was impossible - The Bumble Bee Syndrome. Most of the time we couldn't reproduce the results. BUT - sometimes we could figure out how and why the "impossible" wasn't.
As is the case with most things, "conventional wisdom" has a long set of DOs and DON'Ts. Turning seems to have more than its share this. Now a lot of the DON'Ts have to do with safety - spinning a chunk of wood and then poking it with a sharp tool is "obviously" an insane thing to do. I'm sure there was an observer watching the first turner about to spin some wood, sharp rock ready to cut off wood - who was yelling "YOU'RE GONNA DO WHAT?!!!!!!"
Now it might be because many woodturners are self taught and didn't know any better, that there are so many tools and techniques for doing the same thing, and some tools and techniques that "conventional wisdom" wasn't aware of. Then some guy in a little shed behind his house, or in his basement, did something in a state of ignorant bliss, which opened up a new turning possibility - or a new way or doing things - or a trip to the emergency room (or maybe even the morgue).
Take the "fingernail" grind on a bowl gouge. Someone, probably in a hurry, may have ground a roughing gouge "wrong" and used it anyway to get a job done. A light bulb went off in his/her head - "Hey, if I grind the wings back a bit more . . ."
You may have seen the bowl gouge with the asymetric finger nail grind that is used to cut on both side of centerline - the conventional "downward into the tool rest" side AND the "upward away from the tool rest" side - on the inside of a bowl. Now when you think about it - on the outside of a bowl you use only one edge. One the inside of the bowl you use the opposite edge. You seldom alternate between inside turning and outside turning on a bowl. That means you have to stop and sharpen the edge you're using more often - even though the other edge is still sharp.
I'm sure I've done things with a curved edge skew that I probably shouldn't have done - loose rings for example. Perhaps because I do smaller pieces the potential danger was significantly lessened - larger could've spelled disaster. Maybe scale is a factor in what can and can't be done - or more accurately - should and shouldn't be done.
I hollow lidded boxes and even some bowls with a skew. Made sense to me at the time and I've found it works well enough - for me. Drill a hole and then shove the long point against it and push. Works like a scraper - though a lot faster. The finish isn't as nice but hey - that's what the "80 Grit Gouge" is for.
So what have you come up with that "convntional wisdom" says you can't or shouldn't do?
charlie b member of the ATA (Anarchist Turners Association)
- a contradiction in terms? The motto "There are no RULES, only recomendations"