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I have been harvesting bowl /platter blanks and coring with local woods for many years. I want to get into hollowing and approached the blanks in a similar manner, turned thick and Anchor-sealed. I have some that are a little over a year old and not quite ready. I made a few more cherry blanks today. My question , is this the preferred process? How do you "hollowers" do this?
Attachment 298718Attachment 298719
Nice looking curl in the 3 darker ones pictured!
If you are getting away without cracks and minimal warpage, you are doing fine.
Myself, I do a DNA soak and wrap in paper until dry. I never had much success with anchorseal.
It appears you are sealing the interior. I think your drying time will decrease if you seal only the exterior and let the form lose moisture from the inside. That way, the form contracts from the inside.
Roger what John says.
I live in PA and I don't seal hollow form rough outs at all. Our weather is often humid so our stock will dry slowly. If we lived in an dry climate our process would be much different. I turn to a thickness appropriate to the diameter and specie then bag them in brown bags. I've never have a problem. If you store them in a damp place, change the bag after a week or two to avoid mildew.
faust
I do a lot of HF's and just ;place the in a brown paper bag and lay them on the floor in the corner of a room in the back of my shop. After about 6 months I check them and if they have dried mostly I take them out of the bag and put them on a shelf to finish drying for the next 6 months or longer. one can usually tell that the peace has dried a bit by looking at the tendon. It will turn oblong as it dries. Once you get enough hollowed it might be 2 years or more before you get a chance to return them.
Jack
Thanks" Hollowers", the cherry blanks in the left photo do not have any wax on them. I am going to try all three methods: dna, brown bags and sealing the outside of the blanks.
These look like they are loads thick.
For open form bowls, where you would have more moisture escaping surface, the rough rule is about an inch thick for the 10-11 inch diameter bowl to deal with the warpage factor.
With these hollow forms, where the inside is much more closed and structurally supported, you should likely be able to go a bit thinner as it will be slower to lose moisture in the enclosed space and have a bit less warpage. If you are not losing any to cracking then that is good, but if you could go a bit thinner they would dry a bit faster if you needed them sooner.