Cracked Beech Bowl

[David Gilbert]

I have an in-process beech bowl that has developed a crack that you can see in the attached photo. This bowl was turned green to final thickness, rough sanded and then saturated with Minwax Antique Oil (MAO). The bowl is about 13" wide by 5" tall and 3/8" thick below the lip. My normal process, after the bowl has dried, would be to resand and then reseal with MAO. Beech moves a lot and in this case it cracked on the side but not all the way up to the lip. The crack is about 1/16" at its widest.

I'd like to save this bowl by filling the crack with black epoxy. My question is how do I fill this gap without staining all the adjacent wood? The problem is that I don't have a lot of sanding volume or space to sand away the overflow. For smaller cracks, I paint MAO around and in the crack and then use thin CA to fill it. I tried this on a test piece but the black epoxy penetrated all the adjacent wood and couldn’t be sanded out. Any suggestions will be appreciated.

Cheers,
David

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[Pete Copeland]

In stead of using black epoxy you could fill the crack with cocoa (or finely-ground coffee) and then fill with CA. I had luck with CA and cocoa on one of my recent pieces.

[Tim Leiter]

I know you did a lot of work to get the bowl to this shape. But in my opinion, when someone tries to fix a cracked bowl, it still is just a cracked bowl. I personally would put it in the firewood pile. That's just my opinion and it is worth just what you paid for it.

[Thomas Canfield]

David,

Spray the area of the crack lightly with shellac, both inside and outside. That will seal the ajacent wood and allow the crack filling medium to enter the crack.

You could use Thin CA followed by Medium or Thick CA to fill the 1/16" gap. The gap can also be packed with some dust (sanding dust alone or mixed with instant coffee for color). At the least, I suggest you should try to make a repair just for the experience and confidence when this happens (and it will) again.

[Eric Gourieux]

I use a process similar to Thomas. I spray the adjacent area with lacquer (I assume shellac would work as well) and fill with wood dust, coffee, turquois, etc and then CA glue, I've had very little trouble with the CA bleeding over into the adjacent wood. I vote for filling the crack. It adds interest and is a conversation starter.

[Jim Burr]

Epoxy doesn’t have a lot of staining factor...to thick to be drawn by the capillary action of the wood. CA, thin will be drawn in by wood fiber like crazy! Maybe think about applying a liberal amount of the finish ofyour choice to the surrounding area. Espresso powder, black powder coat powder,so on work well with CA and it will adhere well to the finish area. If you want to use epoxy, apply a liberal amount of finish and after it dries for a bit, use masking tape to create a boundary/barrier and fill as needed. For both techniques, treat both sides of the piece.
I’ve used these methods dozens of times with great results.

[Baxter Smith]

Last spring I turned a beech bowl to final thickness and as it dried, it developed a crack that opened up to 1/8" or more. After it had completely dried, the crack closed back up to almost be insivisible. If your bowl hasn't completely dried, it might be worthhile to hold off until it has before you proceed.

[William Bachtel]

Tim your advice is the same as mine.

[David Gilbert]

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions regarding my cracked bowl. I did some additional experiments and finally went with my usual coffee and CA method and finally found the time to finish and photograph the bowl. I’ve posted some photos below.

My preferred method for filling a crack is the coffee grounds and CA glue method. I liberally treat the area around the crack with Minwax Antique Oil (MAO). It will even get into the crack and I do both sides about one to two inches around the crack because the thin CA that I use likes to run to any untreated areas where it will show up later. I blot off the excess MAO and apply blue tape to the outside. After waiting for about a minute (or less) I start pushing coffee grounds into the crack. I press them in as hard as I can with some dentist tools and then add thin CA glue with a small plastic pipette. I remove the tape and add the coffee to the outside with more CA. Sometimes I need to repeat the process but if there are only small gaps, I fill those with coffee that is more finely ground. I make sure that the patch is proud of the surface and then I carefully sand off the excess and then completely sand the entire bowl.

I tried shellac to seal the edges but the epoxy still stained and couldn’t be sanded out without leaving a major divot. My feeling is that if the epoxy is thin enough to fill in the crack then it is also thin enough to wick into all the adjacent wood and MAO and shellac didn’t seem to protect the wood enough. I didn't try lacquer. If this was a rough turned bowl that would be re-turned then the epoxy would be worth a try.

I understand the comments about a cracked bowl being defective. Lots of my cracked bowls end up being burnt. Since I normally turn to final thickness and then let them warp, part of the fun is seeing what happens. I usually don’t make bowls this large and my family really likes these popcorn bowls so I went forward and finished it. Beech moves a lot and this bowl and the bowl from the other half of the blank are oval shaped.

Cheers,

David

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[Bill Boehme]

Here is a completely different solution to the problem:

• Get some bare copper wire -- 14 gauge would be fine.
• Use some grinding and filing tools to widen the gap so that it does not look so smooth and regular. An irregular edge will have more interest and look a bit more natural.
• Use a torch or woodburner to very slightly char the edges -- just a tiny amount. we don't want it to look like it was fished out of somebody's fireplace. We want to char it just enough that it starts to resemble a natural defect. Stop when you think that it needs just a bit more charring.
• Drill holes on each side of the split large enough to pass the copper wire through and then proceed to use the wire to "lace up" the crack. An alternative approach is to use leather lacing -- if leather is used make the holes more closely spaced.

Anyway no charge for this idea and besides that, it won't hold water.

One suggestion -- if you turn something to finished dimension green, then make it thin -- really thin. I just finished a really thin 7½" diameter bowl that averages about 3/64" thick except for the bottom which is around 3/16" thick. I can't remember the wood that I used (or never did know). The bowl is fairly wavy, but not cracked.

[robert baccus]

Bill, keep the bowl--more character yeah. Having fixed many cracks and defects I know your concern. Epoxy usually will not stain at all but you only need a little stain in the mix. Also you can mix epoxy with turquois, coffee, brass shavings ect to a thick putty and do well. A few minutes with a 2-3" sander and you am finished already. You can use metal duct tape for a backup or mold also. On a big piece like a log/vase where cracks go through the end and leak try a hot glue gun to stop the leaks. good luck Crotchy cajun