Three quarters

3 out of 4 are now complete. This is a chunk of Sissoo from Boyce Thompson Arboretum that I roughed out about 6 months ago (http://agoodturndaily.blogspot.com/2011/09/labors-of-day.html?m=0).













This piece has some nice curl in some of the sap wood and surrounding a couple of the knots. Like all Sissoo it has great contrast between the heart wood and the sap wood. There was probably more sap wood on this blank to start with but I didn't want a solid band of sapwood around the middle of the blank.












The opening on this piece is slightly larger than I'd like, I had to true up the warping that occurred during drying. As a result the opening is about 1.2". I was shooting for 1" but that didn't happen. One upside: the larger opening did make hollowing easier.









Overall dimensions are 6.5" diameter and just a hair under 8" tall.

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Variety show

I have back to back shows coming up in April so I'm trying to get a few more pieces done. I'm also working on a piece for the next President's challenge. Today I started work on 1 hollow form and continued work on 3 others.













This one is some highly figured Maple I got from Mike Mahoney this past summer. I rough turned the outside of this piece a few months back and I'm finally getting back to it.










Next up is a piece of Spalted Beech. I got 2 pieces of this wood 4 or 5 years ago, the other piece was made into a box and given back to the guy I got the wood from. It's a little bit punky on the end grain so I've applied a coat of oil to stiffen the fibers.













Next up is a chunk of Sissoo from Boyce Thompson Arboretum. I rough turned this one a couple months ago, today I trued up the outside and got it ready to finish hollowing.














Last is a piece of Box Elder Burl I received in a trade this past summer. It's my intention to use this piece as my 'Natural Edge' piece for the President's Challenge.




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Super bowl Sunday

It's Super Bowl Sunday and first thing this morning I decided to work on some roughouts. These 10 bowls are all Sissoo, the 2 on far right were turned last weekend at the Woodcraft woodworking expo. The other 8 were all roughed and cored this morning. This log was from a tree removed at Boyce Thompson Arboretum this past fall. I only have 2 pieces left from this tree.






Mid way through the roughing process I had a bit of an accident. I was stripping the bark off of one of the crotch pieces and when it broke free suddenly I ended up jamming my thumb into the edge of the blank and splitting it open. It looks much worse than it really is.
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Woodworking Expo wrapup

Yesterday was the 3rd annual Woodworking Expo in the parking lot of the local Woodcraft.  Our club had a booth that we used to demonstrate woodturning, promote the club, recruit new members, and socialize.

Over the course of the day I turned 5 bowls: 2 Sissoo, 2 walnut (both square), 1 Birdseye maple, a small lidded box out of Olive, a 3 sided spindle with a  120 degree twist, and a set of 3 mini hollow forms in Maple burl.  A very productive day.

Desert Ironwood Hollow form

There were probably about 20 booths total, including the Arizona Fine Woodworkers, ArizonaWoodcarvers, Festool, Sawstop, Freud, Easy Wood Tools, and a wood vendor.  They also had a woodworking contest with entries divided into 4 categories: woodturning, wood carving, furniture, and other.  I opted to enter 4 pieces into the woodturning category.  3 prizes were awarded in each category.  The pictures on this page are of my 4 entries.

Oak burl nested set

After seeing all of the entries I thought I had a really good chance to place, if not take first place.  There was some nice work, including several very nice segmented pieces.  I took 3rd place in the woodturning category 2 years ago and took 2nd place last year.  This year I had my heart and sites set on 1st.

Sissoo (Indian Rosewood) hollow form with Macassar Ebony pedestal and finial.

This year the judges were noted turner and featured demonstrator Ernie Conover and Easy Wood Tools owner Craig Jackson.  Last year the judges were David Marks and Marc Spagnuolo of The Wood Whisperer.

The prizes in the Woodturning category were announced first and my name was the first one they called.  The judges has selected this Spalted/Quilted Maple hollow form with Ebony collar (this photo shows a Desert Ironwood collar, I replace it with Ebony after this photo was taken) as the best piece in the category.  My prize was a variable speed Rikon mini lathe, worth about $350.  Last year I won a Supernova2 chuck with insert (~$175) and the year before a close quarters angle drill (~$60).  I still have and still use both of my previous prizes.  Is it too early to start thinking about next year?

Woodworking expo

Saturday is the annual woodworkers expo at the local Woodcraft. Our club will have a booth and I'll be there all day demonstrating and promoting the club. In order to demonstrate I need some wood prepared so I cut up a chunk of Sissoo tonight. I got 6 blanks out of the log section, I'll probably take the 4 smaller pieces, leaving the 2 larger crotch pieces to work on at home as I think they're better quality than I'd normally use to demo.













I'm also planning to do a trio of mini hollow forms. I've chosen to use a small piece of Maple Burl for the blanks. This is actually a small cutoff from the giant Maple Burl I bought almost exactly a year ago.


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Art festival prep

I found out on Tuesday that I was a late addition to an arts and crafts festival that's taking place this weekend. Now I'm scrambling to get a few extra pieces completed.









This 4 piece nested set in oak burl was tonight's effort. I've had this piece of wood for 5 or 6 years and finally got around to roughing it out about 6 months ago. Since then it has been kicking around the shop waiting to be finished.









I'm ecstatic with the results. I think it's probably the best nested set I've ever done and should be well suited to this event. It will undoubtedly have a prime spot in my booth and I need to take some quality photos in case it sells.








Next up is a hollow form I've been working on for a while. It's mesquite with sapwood and the natural edge surrounding the opening. I had a near disaster with this piece last night. I don't have time to go into detail.







Suffice it to say I was able to salvage the piece, even after being within 30 seconds from tossing in the bin. In truth I would nave cut it in half before tossing in the recycling bin to see how consistent the wall thickness is and where it could be improved.







Last is a hollow form I started a while back. I finally got around to turning the pedestal, lid, and finial. The lid and finial are 2 pieces, the pedestal is one solid piece. Both the pedestal and lid/finial are made of Macassar Ebony.






Overall size is 7 1/2" diameter and 17" tall.







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Labors of the day

I spent 3 hour in the shop this Labor Day morning. It was an early start, about 8:30 because I wanted to avoid as much of the heat as possible. Even that early it was still 90 degrees when I started, one of the down sides to living in the desert.

During that 3 hours I was able to do the rough hollowing on all 6 pieces. They've all been hollowed to 1/2-3/4" thick and bagged for drying. Hollowing was both easier and more difficult because the wood is green. It's easier because the green wood cuts easier and faster than dry. Harder because the green wood shavings tend to clump together inside the piece. This means that in the early stages of hollowing it's 20-30 seconds of hollowing and then 20-30 seconds of blowing out the shavings using compressed air. That can be frustrating To say the least but becomes less of a problem as hollowing progresses. Then centrifugal force starts to become an issue as the shavings are thrown out from center to the largest diameter and because of the moisture content they clump together, often just out of reach of my outstretched fingers.


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Sleepy hollow

It's a long weekend and I've decided to use it on hollow forms. To that end I started out by cutting one of my Sissoo logs into 6 pieces of various lengths. Each piece was then mounted between centers and the outside shape was turned. I also roughed out a piece of quarter sawn curly Ash I got from Mike Mahoney.








I then hollowed the ash to 1/2-3/4" thickness and bagged it to dry. The piece on the left is Chinese Elm from back in April (http://agoodturndaily.blogspot.com/2011/04/catch-up.html). I put off finishing the bottom for a long time, my new 6" vacuum drum came in handy again. The short piece on the right is Eucalyptus (see below).








This pair was started about 4 months ago. I didn't intend to wait this long to get back to them, they just didn't take a high priority as they're already dry and Eucalyptus isn't one of me favorites to turn when dry. I normally don't use Eucalyptus but I will make an exception when I find a piece like this.








The bottoms still need some work and both pieces still need sanding and finishing. You can see the initial shaping and hollowing here: http://agoodturndaily.blogspot.com/2011/04/artists-arboretum.html


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Giving back

I'm headed back to BTA in the morning to get the last piece of the Sissoo stump. Part of the agreement with the arboretum is that they get finished pieces made from the wood that I receive. The weed pots are from some Acacia Visco that they cut down to make way for new water feature.








The bowl is some of the Sissoo I helped cut a couple weeks ago. This particular piece is mostly Quartersawn with just a bit of sapwood and is roughly 7 1/2" x 2".













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Strange Daze

I tried darkening the Mesquite with Lye but it didn't darken as much as I wanted it to so I colored it with Sharpie marker. I'm still planning to do a couple more variations before I break out the Ebony.














This evening I did a small pair of Mountain Mahogany hollow forms. They're not as thin or as light as I'd like (pretty tough to get light weight with woods like Mountain Mahogany or Desert Ironwood). I wanted to have something to show at our club meeting this weekend and I'm not sure my Sissoo hollow form from above will be complete by Saturday morning.

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Prototype save

Before I start turning the ebony I purchased I figured I should try to prototype a design in some scrap mesquite. I'm fairly happy with my first effort but I can see some room for improvement.

I think the finial could be taller and thinner, the stem on the pedestal could also be thinner and all of the other elements can be tweaked slightly.









To the left is the Macassar Ebony I purchased at my local Woodcraft. It appeared darker and more uniform in color when covered in wax but I've seen much lighter Macassar Ebony before too.

I think I'll do another couple prototypes before starting to turn the ebony. I may also try dyeing the Mesquite black to get a better idea what the piece will look like when it is finished.

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Sissoo Salvage

A bit more work on the Sissoo hollow form tonight. I was able to locate the piece that tore out last night and glued it back into place. I then turned the base a little smaller before sanding the entire piece, applied a coat of oil and parted off the base, leaving a small tenon on the bottom for future use.








I also made a trip to the local Woodcraft and bought a piece of Macassar Ebony (among other things). I intend to use it to turn a small thin stem pedestal and a lid/finial.

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Bad words

Tonight I decided to chuck up and hollow a good sized chunk of green Sissoo (Indian Rosewood - Dalbergia Sissoo).















I don't normally hollow green to finished thickness but decided to in this case. This piece is 9" tall and about 8" diameter. It could have been a larger diameter but I wanted less sapwood.














Unfortunately getting it down to final thickness on the bottom the green endgrain tore out, leaving a hole in the bottom about 1/2" diameter.















Normally I'd trash the piece at this point (as I did last night on a much smaller piece with a different problem) but I have too much invested in this piece. So now I have to figure out how to salvage it, but without making it look like a save. I have a few ideas already but I'm also open to suggestions.

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Weekend warrior

A batch of Sissoo bowls from this weekend. All 8 of these were turned green to finish and then microwaved to speed the drying process. They all need a good sanding and a quick finish now that they're mostly dry.









I don't normally turn green to finish but I wanted these to go back to the Arboretum As soon as possible. I think they'll be pleased.

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Boyce Beauty

A pile of Sissoo (Dalbergia Sissoo, AKA Indian Rosewood) sourced from Boyce Thompson Arboretum yesterday. The big piece on the top is actually a big crotch piece.









The butt end of the crotch piece. I assisted taking this tree down, sectioning it up, and cleaning up the mess yesterday. It had some frost damage (yes, it does sometimes get below freezing in AZ) and the Arboretum decided it needed to be removed.








Tonight I ripped the crotch in half to prepare it for turning. I was not disappointed with what I found. I'm now thinking about ripping a platter blank off of the face of this blank to best preserve this amazing grain. The bowl made from the remaining wood would be shallower and slightly smaller diameter but the spectacular platter would be worth it.

There's 1 more piece at the arboretum with my name on it. Their chainsaw broke down before the last cut could be made. There's also 5 or 6 pieces about 8" diameter and 4' long but I'm not as interested in them. Lastly there's another very similar tree that they plan to take out soon. I'm already on the short list to help them take that one out.

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