First Bowl Disaster

[Jack Hogoboom]

Just to show that not all of us are pros, attached is a picture of my first bowl. I had Keith Rowley's book open next to me, but somehow, things went awry....

I was doing pretty well until it came time to reverse chuck the bowl. I mounted it in my Talon chuck and started hollowing out the inside. I must've had a catch or something, because the bowl started to wobble. When I looked to see what was wrong, I had somehow broken the tenon off the bowl.

I scratched my head for a little while trying to figure out what to do. I thought about running the bowl through my planer to try to flatten the bottom, but, mercifully, realized that it would've been a stupid thing to do. I finally planed the bottom with a block plane, which is how I discovered that I'd hollowed out the bowl a little too deeply.

Rather than give up, I decided to screw the darn thing back onto the faceplate and finish it. That's how I wound up with the four holes in the bottom.

Let's just say that I now use this bowl to hold my keys, money, receipts, etc., and leave it at that.

I learned a few lessons with this bowl. I just wish I hadn't learned them all at once.

Jack

[Christopher Pine]

Well the wood is amazing! The bowl looks great too just that there is a hole in the bottom.. but really its hardly noticeable
Chris

[Dennis Peacock]

Nice bowl there Jack...but I don't think it will hold much water.

This is the exact reason why I leave all the bottoms of my bowls a little thicker than the rest of the bowl. It's very frustrating to be almost done with the bowl and SAND through the bowl bottom because I turned it too thin to begin with.

Yup....just keep it and use it for what ever. Nice wood and a job well done any way.!!!! Thanks for sharing your "boo-boo".!!!! None of us are perfect!

[John Miliunas]

Were it not for the beautiful wood, I think I have several of its cousins over here at my place! It's all part of the learning, Jack. Heck, that's half the fun!

[Bill Grumbine]

Jack, I made a number of bowls like that in the past. Once in a while I still do. Here is a picture of the last piece where I snapped the tenon off and had to recover from it.

<img src="http://www.enter.net/~ultradad/mapleburlvase01.jpg">

It is frustrating, but don't let it get you down. There is always more wood to be had.

Bill

[Michael Cody]

Just to show that not all of us are pros, attached is a picture of my first bowl. I had Keith Rowley's book open next to me, but somehow, things went awry....

Jack

Been there done that, got the T-Shirt, wore it out .. if'n it twas me, I would mount a piece of ebony or blackwood then a new glue block/tennon, or if you want to go a touch cheaper, ebonized walnut to the bottom, turn it down and leave a small rim/base on it say 1/2" to 1/4" thick .. turned to same curve & dimension as the bowl side.. ie try to leave a black/dark rim at the bottom, then turn out the inside to show it off ...

[Fred LeBail]

Happened to me with a maple burl and I signed it " A Bowl with a Hole"
Beautiful peice of wood!
Fred

[Jack Hogoboom]

Bill,

How do you "recover" from a broken tenon?

Mike,

Great idea about the contrasting wood. My problem was/is that I couldn't get the bottom completely flat. That's what made me think of the planer.

Jack

[Gilbert Vega]

Bill,

How do you "recover" from a broken tenon?

Mike,

Great idea about the contrasting wood. My problem was/is that I couldn't get the bottom completely flat. That's what made me think of the planer.

Jack

I can tell you how a beginner (3 months) attacked that problem. On one bowl I used my Cole jaws to attach to the rim and turned down the broken tenon. The inside was thick enough to so that a second tenon could be done on the bottom. Once done, just flip over and complete the inside. On a second bowl, I couldn't use the jaws so I attached the bowl rim with CA to a faceplate. Turned new tenon then completed the inside.

[Bill Grumbine]

Bill,

How do you "recover" from a broken tenon?

Jack

There are pretty much three ways to fix a broken tenon, Jack. Rarely, and in the case of the bowl I posted above, you can just glue it right back on and keep going. I say rarely because often the bowl will wobble too much to make it worthwhile, or the glue joint may not be sufficient to stand the strain. In this case I broke it while coring out the center - and it being held in a steady rest to boot! I wanted as much height as possible, so I tried gluing it on, and it worked. I had to true up the rest of the bowl to get it running right again, but I had plenty of material for that.

Second, you can turn a new tenon on the bottom, as Gilbert mentions. This will work if you still have plenty of meat left in the blank, and I mean the whole thing, not just the bottom, because this often requires reshaping the whole outside to reestablish a pleasing shape. Of course, you can just turn the tenon and leave the rest as it is, but now it is very likely that you have an ugly bowl.

Third, you can glue a piece of secondary wood onto the bottom. This requires a fairly smooth flat bottom and good gluing technique for most glues. However, I learned a method of using hot melt glue from a Canadian turner, and so far it has worked very well for me. It involves lots of glue though, so a regular hot melt glue gun isn't going to suffice. I use an old electric frying pan that I got at a second hand store. Once the hot melt glue goes in, it is committed to that use forever. The beauty of this method is that the glue is hot within a couple of minutes, and the mating surfaces do not need to be dead on flat to one another. Just dip one piece or the other in the hot glue, and stick it fast to the other, and within a couple of minutes you are ready to turn again.

There may be other methods or techniques that someone else will share, but these three cover just about any situation you can imagine for reestablishing a tenon which has gone missing. Good luck with it.

Bill