Minimum Thickness for roughed bowl

Re: Minimum Thickness for roughed bowl

Bill Hale / The Wood Spinner

>Ryan

The reason to leave thick is to allow you to re-turn to round. If it is too thin you can not cut the inside and the outside to round and have sides left. You cut the oval off and there will be nothing.

I do not make many small items, less than 6 in.,

but I try to leave those about 3/4. On a 16 in I leave close to 2 in.

Do several at different thickness on different woods and find what works for you.

Good turning and be safe

Bill

Re: Minimum Thickness for roughed bowl

Wally Dickerman at Green Valley, Az.

>Ryan, wall thickness in a rough turned bowl, should be determined by several things. Mostly it's how much the wood will warp as it's drying. If it's an end grain turning, it won't distort very much, so the the walls can be thinner. If it's a large bowl, you should assume that it'll have more distortion than a small bowl. Some kinds of wood will distort more than others. Generally, burl wood distorts very little.

It's important that the wall thickness be fairly constant to try to eliminate the possiblity of cracking.

When you rough turn a bowl or vessel to allow it to dry before finishing it, remember that thicker walls will take longer to dry, but on the plus side they'll allow you an opportunity to make changes to the form of the bowl.

Wally