Shed Plan

Hi Everyone,

Well, the apprentice and I did not get to finish the bowl together. He has been ill and recovering from some surgery earlier this year and just recently got out of the hospital. He had been having some minor nose bleeds the past week and yesterday had a good sized nose bleed and had to visit the ER for treatment. I didnt want to take him into a cold, dusty environment and hes on his way home today so we couldnt finish the turn. But I did go down and finish the turn and hell be able to see online how this went.

Heres the photos:


This is the bowl back on this lathe today and fortunately it hasnt distored. If you look closely you can see the extensive end grain tearing  and the whole thing needed to be hollowed out a lot more and that is what I did. I thinned the walls and then I sharpened by bowl gouge and turned the speed up to 900 rpm and very gently shaved the sides until they were smooth. Then I deepened and rounded out the bottom of the bowl:

This is the bowl after its been shaved. It needed very little sanding. Ive also refined the rim a little and removed some tearing along the rims edge:


And here is the finished bowl. Its got lots of mineral staining and some spalting lines. The color is a buff color and so when Ive applied the salad bowl varnish to it, its going to be really pretty:


This is the bowl from the side:

Now, since this was unseasoned, it has to go in the drying bag for 2 weeks to dry out and stabilize. Well come back to it then and take a look. If the wood fairies are kind to us, it will still be round and un-cracked and ready for varnishing.

So stay tuned for this one at the end of the month.

My next project is a bowl for my friend and colleague, John S.

See you later in the week.

VW

So Teagues blocks are finished - I was aiming for 50 and ended up having time for 46. Not too bad.

Theyre unit blocks, with the basic block having 1x2x2 dimensions. Making these blocks, and their larger siblings, was pretty straight forward - just dimensioning the stock really (well except for a few of the "special" shaped blocks), but it was fun practice.

The width of the stock is very close to the final width of 2 inches, so after planing off the finish (they are old library chairs) it doesnt take much more work to get there with just a jack plane. The thickness is another matter - too much to remove with the jack, and too little to resaw - well, I suppose if I really wanted some thin oak veneer...

I tried my scrub plane, but wasnt happy with the results. Just too much tear out to get close to the layout line. I switched to a #6 fore plane with a fairly cambered iron. It was the right tool for the job, fast, but clean, stock removal. Heres a shot showing two pieces of oak - the right is the "before" and the left is the "after" example.


After the fore plane got things close, it was quick work with the jack to finish removing stock down to the line. It was a little wasteful, but a definite time saver.

I tried to take a picture of the fore plane iron to show the amount of camber:


Heres a shot of work on one pair of ramp blocks:


I had to leave extra wood at the ends to adjust for the kerf and flattening of the angled plane. After everything was true, I cut the ends square and to length. I experimented with several different saws for cutting the angle and ended up liking the Japanese style rip saw the best.

I had anticipated having to do a lot of work with a plane to clean up the cut, but in the end it came out pretty clean straight from the saw. Just a few minutes with the plane, and it was fine.


Chamfering the edges of the blocks was much easier by pulling them over an upside down plane - once again the jack was pressed into service:


The final test of the set before the birthday boy got his hands on them (what can I say, theyre fun!):


In action - I think he liked them, and the chest too:


Im sure I will be making more to expand the set as time goes by and his construction skills grow.