Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge
Yes, I see a few errors, too..
Mike Schwing from Maryland
>But otherwise not bad for a newbie like me. Natural edged yellow poplar (stain free!). Turned translucent thin, slightly less than 1/8", sanded and given a coat of oil. The pic makes the walls look much thicker, maybe its the bark, who knows. Should have chosen a laquer, the sanding error in the pic wouldn't have shown up. About 11" in diameter.
Re: Yes, I see a few errors, too..
Scott Stefanoski in Brittle Baltimore
>very nice mike. the biggest thing i learned from this weekend's wood working show was to be quiet about the mistakes, nobody will usually notice them.
Translucence
RevDoug
>If you will give that bowl about 10 or 11 more coats of that oil, the translucence will be even greater. Otherwise, as the moisture in the cells drys, what you have now will go away, at least to some degree. I like what you have done. I am not noticing any thick walls. The bark looks great. You did a great job of keeping the tools and sandpaper off of it so that it would stay put. Did you have to use any glue to keep it? I'm not noticing any in the pic. Not a bad job at all in my book.
Turn 'em round,
RevDoug
Re: Yes, I see a few errors, too..
Dave Peebles Lyons,Ohio
>Hi Mike,
On my monitor I see no problems at all. That is a great looking natural edge bowl.
You have a real gift for shape and design. I think it looks great!!
Best wishes,
Dave
Errors ??
Julie
>I don't see any errors and I have a 19" monitor. Your bowl is very beautiful, the shape is very nice.
Re: Translucence
Mike Schwing from Md.
>Thanks much for the kind words. I was looking at, oh shoot it escapes me, someone's website where they would soak their work in linseed oil alternately for 12 hours, dry it out for 12 hours and so on for 12 days and the work was very neat looking when done - extremely translucent. I have a desire to try that some day. I think I'll do as you suggest, this poplar is already very very dry as its been through a dozen or more 3 minute microwave cycles.
The bark stays on yellow poplar despite my efforts to knock it off with a tool. No glue. I sanded the edges by hand/manually to avoid doing any damage, after having an apple turning explode on me and expose some of the red stuff that lives inside me. Caught an edge and BANG!
My turning has improved hundreds of percent, including keeping bark on, since learning how to use, and stick with, the Ellsworth grind. Its the only tool I've used for a good while now.
Re: Translucence
Brad Vietje
>Mike,
Looks good from here. If you want this or your next Poplar piece to have more translucence, you might look into Urethane Oil. Peter Bloch uses Aspen (Poplar) and Urethane Oil in his wooden lampshades, which are very translucent (www.woodshades.com).
U-O can be thinned about 50:50 with mineral spirits for the first 1 or 2 applications, and is usually used 4:1, oil to thinner for most work. Soak it in for a few minutes (it will pass right through the wood), then wipe off with paper towels to avoid a hard shine gloss. I usually use 3 coats, and wipe them off after just a minute or two. Dries to a hard, very durable, supportive finish in 3 days or less -- feels dry after about 8 hours, but still not completely polymerized. You can control the sheen once the piece is cured (72 hrs) by buffing with a fine Scotch Bright pad to remove any glossy areas (it will give a very high gloss if left to pool up anywhere on the wood, or if not wiped off). Then buffing by hand with a dry paper towel will give you as much luster as you want. Most translucent pieces I see are low gloss, but shiny and translucent would work well for some items. I haven't tried buffing it with a Beal sort of system, but many others do.
Safe Spinning,
Brad Vietje
Thetford, VT (high of 12 today, HIGH of -10 to +5 Thursday !)