vacuum chucking

[Don Meyer]

I was wondering if it was feasible to use a vacuum chuck for final turning of the outside of rough turned bowls. I am having a little bit of difficulty turning the outside to final dimensions left handed. Is there anybody who does the outsides of their bowls in this manner. Will the vacuum hold the bowl well enough to do this safely?

[Steve Schlumpf]

Don - guess I am curious as to what problems you are experiencing when starting to final turn your bowls? The only problem I can see with vacuum chucking a rough out blank would be getting a good seal. Every blank that I start to final turn is warped - enough so that a vacuum chuck would not work. Instead - I open the jaws of my Talon chuck, grab the tailstock and squeeze the turning between them - sort of a jam chuck. Then turning the piece to final size has never been a problem.

So, what problems have you been having?

[Don Meyer]

The problems that I have been having are I attach the bowl to the chuck by the tenon and mount it on the headstock. This positions the bowl that I have to turn the bowl the opposite way that I roughed it out having to turn it left handed so to speak.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Don - I am sure we all have our own way to finish bowls and I hope my method isn't to drastic compared to yours. I start off opening the jaws on my Talon chuck as far as they will go. Then place the bowl over the chuck jaws and use the tailstock to push the bowl into position - it actually works as a jam chuck. At that time I can true up the tenon, shape and sand the outside of the bowl. At that point - the outside of the bowl is finished. I then reverse the setting so that the tenon is now held by the chuck and the tailstock is not used at all. Finish turn and sand the inside of the bowl. So far - all the turning is from the same side of the lathe - same direction - so, no left handed turning involved.

To remove the tenon - I use a donut chuck, a vacuum chuck or use the tailstock to hold the bowl in place (jam chuck again) and turn the tenon down to the point that I can saw the nubbin and sand what little remains.

Hope that helps and doesn't add to the problem.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Not sure what the problem is but I do pretty well what Steve does to true up the tenon and true up the outside of the bowl. When I chuck it up I use a down hill cut (from the rim to the base as close to the chuck as I can get without hitting it) and then either use a sheer cut or a vertical sheer cut to finalize the outside. I then sand to finish. Then I start true up the inside of the bowl.

[Ryan Baker]

I also pretty much do it the way Steve described. When I get the outside-returned blank remounted with the tenon in the chuck, I usually do a final clean-up of the outside with a shear cut. That usually ends up being a right-handed cut even though the foot of the bowl is in the chuck. However, learning to work left-handed is something you really need to practice doing, since there are a lot of times in turning that you just can't do the cut you need to without switching hands. Keep trying those left-hand cuts and you will probably start getting used to it fairly quickly. I've found that I am a lot more comfortable with left-handed cuts than I used to be.

[Jason Clark2]

Ditto what Steve said, use friction against the chuck and the tailstock to secure the piece while you true up the tenon and the outside. It doesn't matter if the inside gets a little marred a you're going to clean it up anyway.

[Dave Schell]

This raises a fascinating question in my mind. Over the weekend, I attended the NC Symposium and sat in on a couple of Stuart Batty demos. He is a big advocate of the push cut rather than the pull cut. But everytime I have seen him demo, it has been on a completely dried full blank - not a rough out. So he has been able to mount the blank on a screw chuck, remove the tailstock from the lathe, and then he can do a push cut all the way up the outside of the blank.

If you are mounting a roughed out blank, I can't see any option to do a uphill (with the grain) push cut where the headstock or tailstock is not in the way. Or anyway to mount the piece without using the tailstock (other than vacuum chucking - which may be tough to do on a warped roughout).

Gloat: the good news is that I'm traveling down to West Palm Beach next week to take a 2 day Stuart Batty hands-on class - so hopefully all my questions will be answered.

[Don Meyer]

I want to thank everyone who replied to my post. You have given me some sound advise on different techniques to help me out. I am still new to all this but hopefully I will slowly figure it all out. Thanks.

[Dick Gerard]

If you already have a vacuum chuck (assuming you do from what you already said), go to the OneWay site and view the video(s) of how Dave Lancaster remounts a roughed out blank so that he can do finish turning. It works!