10" dogwood (??) bowl, thanks for the help on faceplates, SMC!

[Steve Paxman]

All,

I asked a question last week about faceplates, and got tons of awesome help here. Thanks!

So I turned that bowl, and made a youtube video of the whole process (including a faceplate discussion), doing the whole thing with carbide lathe tools. My reason for doing my youtube videos with just carbide tools is, basically, there are a ton of turners doing youtube videos with traditional tools who are way better than I am, so I don't have much to add there. But not many doing videos that focus on carbide tools. So I'm filling a niche there.

http://youtu.be/NJG3OzeMGxg

Clicky on the linky there to watch the video. Comments welcome.

Medium quality instagram photo of the bowl here:

dogwood bowl.jpg

[John Keeton]

Steve, interesting video. I might suggest that you use tailstock support whenever possible, just as an added precaution. And, if you begin your roughout from the tailstock side, it might not be as rough on you. That way, you aren't "pounding away" at the corners, but instead are taking off material as you create the rounded profile of the bowl.

Just some thoughts. Others may disagree.

[Reed Gray]

Steve, I am with John here on using the tailstock. Better support, especially for an unbalanced piece of wood. You did refer to the carbide tipped tool as a 'gouge'. Not sure if that was a 'mis-speak' or not. They are scrapers. I didn't know the difference when I started and as I say during demos 'I had no problem gouging equally big holes with either tool'. I still have some scrapers with a G on the bottom, and some gouges with an S on the bottom. I find I get a lot less vibration/impact shock is I start on the bottom of the bowl and work my way to the edges than if I start on the side and round it up the way you do. Good video on showing scraper skills.

That piece does look like dog wood. One of my favorite woods.

robo hippy

[Steve Paxman]

Good point about the tailstock, both of you. I really need to get in that habit. Seems like my (bad) habit is that if it's a bowl, I just slide it way back out of the way until the very end when I have it turned around to clean up the foot. I should work on the habit of using it as much as possible.

Also, roughing the whole thing from the bottom of the bowl is a good idea. Can't believe I haven't thought of that before! I'm totally going to do that next time. I have plenty of half-logs laying about to do that with.

Robo, you are correct, that square-tipped carbide cutter works as a scraper. I did call it a gouge - when I was filming, I almost corrected myself in the moment, but then didn't bother. I guess it was just habit. I do have several carbide tools that don't always work as scrapers, though. Cupped lips that provide a real cutting edge in various different geometries. Obviously, these things don't really have a standardized name, but then again, what's in a name, right? I'm forcing myself sometimes to figure out how to do something with a carbide tool that I might otherwise use a traditional tool to do, because I'm simply trying to make that the point of my channel. (though I'm most likely to give in and use a skew chisel from time to time, which I don't think is cheating too much...)

Thanks again, John and Robo!

-Steve

[robert baccus]

Nice video and a clean shop too. Ditto on the cutting the bottom from center to edge--much easier. That's pretty wood but it ain't dogwood--bark's wrong and no spark's flying. Dogwood is one of the very hardest native woods and splits like fruitwood on a dry day.

[Reed Gray]

Another point on using the tailstock is that your headstock bearings will last a lot longer because shock loads are shared rather than all taken by the headstock. I wore out a set of headstock bearings on my PM3520A in about 5 years turning chain sawn blanks with no tailstock.

robo hippy

[Tom Megow]

That is a huge piece of Dogwood! The only dogwood I've worked had alot of pink and light purples.Made very nice stuff

[Justin Stephen]

That's pretty wood but it ain't dogwood--bark's wrong and no spark's flying. Dogwood is one of the very hardest native woods and splits like fruitwood on a dry day.

Here is a picture of my hand (for scale) next to my flowering dogwood tree at my house in Maryland. Maryland is crawling with dogwood:

http://i.imgur.com/A8AxE1M.jpg

While there may be several varieties of dogwood, the bark on mine sure looks nothing like the bark on the chunk of wood in your video. I'm with Robert, probably not dogwood.

[John Conklin]

Nice bowl Steve and very enjoyable video. I subscribed to your channel, seeing that I'm addicted to YouTube woodworking vids... much more worthwhile than regular TV.