Bam! Whir! Sorry, Sir!

Vaughn McMillan

Administrator
Staff member
Messages
36,054
Location
ABQ NM
This one was an adventure in turning. It started out planned to be a long-necked vase (spalted alder, once again), so I decided to try hollowing it from the bottom. As things developed I decided I wanted a bit wider and shorter neck, so I ended up with this. (In hindsight, considering the shape it ended up being, I could have hollowed it from the top.):

HF037 - 01 800.jpg HF037 - 03 800.jpg

I wasn't happy with the finish, so it was back to the shop for some more sanding and lacquer. I was buffing out the new lacquer on the tripoli wheel last night, and this happened:

HF037 - 04 800.jpg

Yep...I caught it wrong and spit it out into the lathe bed and out the back. Bad words were said. The only way I had to remount the piece with with the donut chuck. I have several different sizes of rings, and two sets of holes on my faceplate. This piece was too small for my smallest big ring, and too big for my largest small ring, so I doubled them up like this:

HF037 - 07 800.jpg

And reworked the neck like this:

HF037 - 08 800.jpg

A bit more Antique Oil and lacquer, and the end result was this:

HF037 - 10 800.jpg HF037 - 12 800.jpg

It's about 6 1/4" wide by 5" tall. There are a couple of dings in the side from the lathe bed, but they're hard to see and deep enough that I decided to leave them as-is, since sanding them out would have made it lop-sided. I also tried to get as much curve into the new neck as possible, but I didn't have a lot of wood to work with, since the walls were already pretty thin at the neck.

Not really what I had in mind, but I figure it's better than nothing.

Let the finger pointing and giggling commence. :rolleyes:
 
VERY nice save! :clap:

How long did it take you to get it centered up in the donut chuck?

I'm going to say that I actually like the save piece better than the unbroken piece.

Nice stuff for sure! :D
 
Very nice save Vaughn! If you hadn't shown the first version we never would have known. Oh, and my vote for the understatement of the year - "Bad words were said.":rofl:

Beautiful piece,

Wes
 
Great save, Vaughn! Like I've said before... you can't say you've had the full Beall experience without at least one launch under your belt.

I like the final form best anyway.

Isn't woodturning wonderful? It even allows us to add to our vocabulary!
 
Vaughn,

I like the first one, but I like the save too... ;)

But I'm most interested in Stu's question... What's involved with recentering it on the donut chuck? I've never done a hollow form, but in a more general sense, if I've got a big chunk of wood, I start turning it on a faceplate, then turn something for the chuck to grab. Invariably, when the piece gets chucked, no matter how careful I am, I still need to return the outside, to get it to the "new" round. That must be doubly hard with a donut chuck. Or am I missing something? ;)

Thanks,

Bill
 
Yeah, the majority of comments here and elsewhere seem to favor the re-worked form over the original.

Stu, it only took a few minutes to get it centered, but I didn't get it centered exactly. As a result, the curve in the neck is not even. I had to rotate the piece carefully when I photographed it so the neck curve would appear even. Here's an example of the unevenness:

Neck Detail.jpg

However, this morning it dawned on me how to make a cone that'll go onto my live center and ensure the neck is properly centered. I'll probably remount this piece again tonight and touch up the curve. (If my new idea works, I won't even need the donut. Bonus! I'll show pics later.)
 
Top