Poplar Wood Segmented Bowl

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This is a Poplar wood bowl with a Walnut rim. The bowl measures 3 inches high and 7.5 inches in diameter. It is made up of 12-segment rings. The Poplar wood is from an old piano I helped break up last Summer. I got some of the wood from that. This bowl was wet sanded with mineral oil up to 400 grit, then stained. Then it was given a finish of high speed wax. The wood grain on this looks like tiger's eye. Lovely.

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Silver Maple Bowl

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Here's a nice Silver Maple bowl. It measures 3 inches high by 3 inches in diameter. It was wet sanded with mineral oil up to 400 grit, then given a coat of boiled linseed oil. This bowl feels like satin to the touch.

Mahogany/Maple Segmented Wood Bowl

This is a 6 inch diameter bowl 3.5 inches high. The wood is, top to bottom, two rows of Mahogany with strips of Maple in between, then a row of Maple with strips of Mahogany in between. Then a row of Maple, and a base of Mahogany. It was wet sanded with mineral oil up to 320 grit. A coat of linseed oil was applied, then the bowl was burnished with its own shavings. It has a beautiful satin finish.

10 Inch Scrap Wood Bowl

Here's a 10 inch bowl made from Ponderosa Pine and Douglas Fir. The base is 2/3 Doug Fir and 1/3 Pine. The sides are Ponderosa Pine. This is the largest diameter bowl I've turned so far. This was made just to do something with some scraps of wood and to bone up on my lathe chisel skill. This was wet sanded up to 320 grit and given a coat of high speed wax.
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Scrap Wood Bowl: Walnut, Mahogany and Ponderosa Pine

This bowl measures 6.25 inches in diameter and 3 inches high. The wood is (top to bottom) Walnut rim, Mahogany (dark wood), Ponderosa Pine (light wood), and the base is a different kind of Mahogany (I think. Not sure about this one.) The bowl was, as usual, wet sanded with mineral oil up to 400 grit, then given a coat of boiled linseed oil, then burnished with wood shavings, and finished up with a high speed wax. This almost looks like a basket weave design in the middle section of the sides. I think this might be the best bowl I've turned so far. The wood grain on this looks fantastic in the sun light. Shines like a jewel.

Scrap Wood Bowl: Pine and Mahogany

This Mahogany and Pine bowl measures 5.5 inches in diameter and 3 inches high. Top rim and base layer are both Mahogany. The bowl was wet sanded with mineral oil, given a coat of boiled linseed oil, then burnished with wood shavings. The final coat was a high speed wax. High Speed Wax is an alcohol, shellac and carnuba wax mixture applied with a rag while the bowl is spinning at high r.p.m. which heats the wax and shines and hardens it.

Scrapwood Bowls: Plywood

This scrap wood bowl was made with two kinds of plywood; furniture grade plywood (5-ply, middle section) and Baltic Birch plywood (7-ply, top section and base layer). The middle section and the base are oriented in a horizontal position, and the top layer and second layer from the bottom are oriented in a vertical position. The dimensions are 5.5 inches in diameter and 3.5 inches high. It was wet sanded with mineral oil up to a 320 grit, burnished with its own shavings, then given a coat of high speed wax.

Scrap Wood Bowls: Segmented Mahogany and Pine 2

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This bowl measures 5.5 inches  in diameter and 3 inches high. The dark wood is Mahogany, the light wood is Pine. I wanted to use Maple but I didn't have any. The base is furniture grade plywood with a Maple veneer. The edge of the base was stained. The bowl was wet sanded up to 320 grit then burnished with wood shavings, then a high speed wax was lightly applied.

Top view.

Scrap Wood Bowls: Segmented Mahogany and Pine

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I upgraded to a new lathe, another Midi size lathe, this one a Delta variable speed model. While I was building a mobile lathe stand for it and making room for it in my shop, I cut and glued-up some blanks made of some nice scrap wood. Trying out a new miter gauge, I wanted to try some segmented bowl turning. When you don't have a big chunk of wood to put on the lathe, segmented layers is the way to go.
This scrap wood bowl measures 5.5 inches in diameter and 3 inches high. The base is furniture grade plywood with the edge stained. The segmented layers are 12 segments per layer. The sides are Mahogany (dark) and Pine (light). The rim is Mahogany. It was wet sanded with mineral oil up to 320 grit, burnished with shavings. The edge of the base was stained. No other finish was applied.

Top view.

Scrap Wood Bowls: Segmented Plywood

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Here's a bowl made from scrap pieces of plywood and mahogany. The bowl measures 4.5 inches in diameter and 2.75 inches high. The base is Mahogany plywood. The sides are furniture grade 5-ply plywood with the layers aligned vertically and offset by half a segment. The rim is Mahogany. All the layers except the base are 12-segment rings glued on top of each other. This was wet sanded with mineral oil, burnished with its own shavings. No other finish was applied.

Another End Grain Sycamore Bowl

Here's another Sycamore end grain bowl, measuring 4 inches in diameter and 2.5 inches high. Wet sanded with mineral oil, finished with mineral oil as well. This was turned as very green wood, very wet. Surprisingly, not warpage as it dried. I just wanted to see how this wood turn when wet.

Small Sycamore Bowl

This is a 4 inch in diameter, 2.5 inch high Sycamore bowl, with end grain turning. It was turned as day-old cutting of green wood, very wet. Sycamore has an interesting grain on the sides of the bowl. It looks a bit like crepe paper. A nice clear grain wood. Not much warpage on this, oddly enough.

Small Sycamore Bowl

This 4 inch in diameter, 1.5 inch high Sycamore bowl was turned very green. Turned the same day it was cut. My neighbor had his big old Sycamore trimmed and I got some of it for myself. Here, as in a previous turning project, I turned this right from the heart wood, and you can see the shrinkage evident in the photo. It was wet sanded with mineral oil, and finished with more mineral oil.

Maple lidded box

This Maple wood box is 5.25 inches in diameter and 3 inches high. Wet sanded with mineral oil. I wet sand almost all my turnings now. It cuts way down on the sanding dust and less heat is generated as well. The finish with this kind of sanding leaves the wood with a satin feel. Feels good in the hand.

Shallow Maple Bowl.

This is a six inch diameter Maple wood bowl, about an inch and a half high. Wet sanded with mineral oil. Finished with boiled linseed oil. This is wood from a tree in my yard. Nice little bowl, with a little bit of fiddle-back grain in it. Lovely wood.

Small Pear Wood Bowl

Here's a small (4 inches diameter by 1.75 inches high) Pear wood bowl, which was turned as green wood, still very wet inside. The log was split right down the middle and half of it was used to turn this bowl. As the bowl dried and shrank it became elliptical in shape, and you can just see how the heart wood didn't shrink as much as the wood further from it. Note the bump on the center of the tree rings. This is a nice wood for turning . . . wet or dry. This one was wet-sanded with mineral oil. Then oiled with a little boiled linseed oil. Here's another shot of the bowl.

Eucalyptus Bowl

This bowl is turned from Eucalyptus wood. The grain and coloration looks almost identical to the Pear wood bowl I turned in the last blog post. This bowl measures 5.5 inches in diameter and 2.5 inches high. It was wet sanded with mineral oil. The finish is a high-speed wax polish.

Pear Wood Bowl

This bowl is turned from Pear wood. It is 5.5 inches in diameter and 2.5 inches high. It is wet sanded with mineral oil, and a hand rubbed boiled linseed oil finish. The finish feels like satin to the touch. Beautiful wood.