Returning To Some Old Bowl Blanks....

Stuart Ablett

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Tokyo Japan
Digging through my piles of stuff, I found eight old Keyaki Bowl blanks. This wood is also known as Zelkova, it is a VERY hard local Elm, when dry it turns like concrete or glass,
hard, hard stuff, have to sharpen all the time and take LIGHT cuts......


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Well this one did not go so well, I did not like the inside shape of the rim and I went back and tried to make just one more cut.... BOOM shrapnel flying!
Sure glad I was wearing my Uvex Bionic face shield that thing is great!


Sigh...


I did have more success with these ones


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All finished with just mineral oil, these are mean to be used, not put on a shelf, so for bowls that are used I really like jut plain mineral oil, you can refresh it easily and it works well, IMHO.


I have three more of these to do, and I checked them all, the are all at about 9% moisture content, which is very dry.


I learned a while back that the traditional Japanese turners who work with this wood a LOT and make really nice thin bowls out of it work it at between 22%-18% moisture content, apparently if you turn then and turn it thin you get very little warping as it dries, I'll have to try that the next time I get some.


Cleaning out some old inventory.


Cheers!
 
What are the dimensions Stu? For OCE (Other Country Education) what would you use them for in your place? Beautiful job by the way!!
 
Very nice Stu. Zelkova has been widely planted as a substitute for american elm in our area over the last twenty years. I have yet to acquire any, but that grain sure looks nice.
 
Nicely done, Stu. :thumb: Regarding the first pic, I'm convinced some pieces of wood simply don't want to be a bowl. That's one of them ;)

Stu, can you submerge a dry blank in a water bath and leave it overnight or a few days/weeks/months and regain moisture?

The wood will soak up some of the moisture, but that won't cause it to behave the way wet wood typically does. When the wood dries, the cells seal up in a way that they can never really regain the moisture they once held. In some cases it can help make for smoother cuts, but it's because the water is acting as a lubricant, not because the wood is softer.
 
Yeah, once the wood is no longer green that ship has sailed.
And one more, lots of work to bring this one off the lathe in good shape, but I think it was worth it!
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Thanks, I like it too.

If you look in the background of the first picture there you will see the last two of these old blanks, the taller one I think will get cut down a bit to make the shape more pleasing.
 
This last picture shown without reading I thought you had made a wooden bowling ball with a weird indent in it for some reason!! Nice job on all of them Stu!!!

Completely off topic, do you get the girls home during summer vacation or does the Canadian school system have such a thing?
 
This last picture shown without reading I thought you had made a wooden bowling ball with a weird indent in it for some reason!! Nice job on all of them Stu!!!

Completely off topic, do you get the girls home during summer vacation or does the Canadian school system have such a thing?

Thanks I like this last one a lot.

Of course they have a summer vacation just like in the US, in fact our eldest has just finished her first year of Applied Science at UBC and while she wanted to do better, she did pass every course, so on to second year Applied Science in September. They don't come home over the summer, or the winter or any other time. We are not rich people just supporting them while they are there stretches us thin, trips to and from Canada to Japan are not cheap. Our eldest came home last spring for two weeks, she left here in 2010, first time home since then.

We do see them every week on Skype, sometimes between all of us talking we spend five or SIX hours on Skype, sure glad it's free!

Cheers!
 
The last few bowls....

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This one is a small kind of tall or deep one, hard to get the inside bottom with a bowl gouge, don't tell anyone, but I used a scraper..... :eek:

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And the last of the Keyaki bowls, the small one at the front right.
I have to say, if I never turn dry Keyaki again, it will be too soon!
I am interested in trying some green Keyaki and turning it until finished and seeing how it warps when it dries, but this bone dry concrete hard stuff, no thanks!



Last blank to turn is this piece of dunno-wood, might be Mukunoki, but I'm not sure, has some weird colors and grains to it, and one large void.

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I left it on the chuck until I fill the void as it will need to be returned to the lathe.

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Id does goe through to the outside, but just barely.

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I covered the surrounding area with masking tape then used my exacto knife to cut out a hole so I could fill the void, but not get the black epoxy all over the bowl.

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I tilted it up so I it would dry in a somewhat level way. I used 30 minute epoxy that I put a few drops of ink from a Japanese Fude (Foo-day) pen. The ink is very finely ground up carbon and water, it only took a couple of drops!
I'm going to see if I can get just the power to use instead of the ink as I think the water in the ink extends the drying time of the epoxy.
I'll wait 24 hours until I finish this bowl, I hope it works out well.

Cheers!
 
No need to wait 24 hours the epoxy was nice and hard when I got back, so I remounted the bowl and had a go.

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I wanted to turn off as much of the epoxy and tape as possible before I started to use the #120 gouge :D

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Looks like I have a low spot and a bubble or two....

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I took some charcoal that I made in a tin and some thin CA glue and filled the low spot and the bubbles.

I think it turned out OK.

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Very interesting looking wood, but I'm not so sure I like it, but someone might...?

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Now they all have their makers marks on them, I need to find a good home for them :D

Cheers!
 
I've had trouble in the past with mixing epoxy and ink. The finished product never fully hardened. It's probably been 8 years or more since I did it, but I can still mark it with a fingernail, and within a week or so the mark will be gone.

That said, I'm not real fond of the patched bowl. I generally like filled voids if they seem to "fit" the piece, but this one just looks kind of out of place to me. I might have been tempted to turn that one away and simply end up with a smaller bowl. But that's just personal opinion. As you said, someone else will likely come along and fall in love with it. :thumb:
 
I've had trouble in the past with mixing epoxy and ink. The finished product never fully hardened. It's probably been 8 years or more since I did it, but I can still mark it with a fingernail, and within a week or so the mark will be gone.

That said, I'm not real fond of the patched bowl. I generally like filled voids if they seem to "fit" the piece, but this one just looks kind of out of place to me. I might have been tempted to turn that one away and simply end up with a smaller bowl. But that's just personal opinion. As you said, someone else will likely come along and fall in love with it. :thumb:

I have to agree with you about the last bowl, the one with the void. If I turned away the void I would have almost nothing left, it would be a plate, and a small one. The wood itself is not that pretty, kind of a gray light yellow color, not the most appealing. In the end it was good practice for filling a void, and if need be I'll use it in the garage to hold parts :D
 
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