Red Eucalyptus Hollow Form.....

Stuart Ablett

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Tokyo Japan
I got this nice chunk of Red Eucalyptus from Vaughn a while back, I have been meaning to turn it, but I had other things come up. Well, today was the day :D

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A nice chunk of wood for sure, I was quite excited to turn this, as Vaughn has turned so many nice hollow forms from the chunks he has, I was certainly hoping to do it justice.

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The piece was not quite square, or flat, had a tilt to it, and I wanted to use my worm screw chuck, so I used my drill press to make a flat spot on it, and drill the pilot hole for the worm screw.

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Things are going along nicely, I mount the blank and support it with the live center, and start shaping it.

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I knew there were some cracks in this piece, I guess I left it too long before I turned it, as it was below 10% moisture content, but I had hoped the cracks would turn away, well they were not......:(

I tried the CA glue to heal this blanks and gave it a go anyways........
 
Stuart, it looks like you are going to turn a hollow form ''alla Vaughn'' isn't.
A pity of the cracks, but you can always repair it with ca glue with some filling stuff.
I think you have enough experience to make something nice out of this chunk.
Would like it to see it when finished.
Good luck. Ad :)
 
............
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I use the chuck adapter on the Oneway live center to swap the hollow forum around, so my other chuck can grab the tenon, this works slick, the hollow form is running dead true when mounted this way.
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Using my drill chuck and an 37mm bit to bore out the center of the hollow form
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and I proceed to hollow it out.

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At this point I've sanded the outside to #400, put a coat of sanding sealer on as well, next I'm going to sand the inside.....

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I cannot remember who taught me this trick, but a dot of CA glue on the sandpaper, stuck to the end of this finger protector thing and man, is it easy to sand inside one of these small hollow forms :thumb:
You can really feel the bumps or ridges and can sand the inside with ease, the paper seems to last a fairly long time too. I turned the lathe down to about 250 rpm to do this.

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Ah, the beginning of the end....... :rolleyes:

I did the live center positioning again on the vacuum chuck, and again this worked VERY well............
 
...... I mounted the hollow form on the vacuum chuck, I was worried about cracking it, so I did not run full vacuum, I left the bleeder valve open a bit, to not let the pump suck at full force.

I had just started to turn the tenon off, and I noticed my 3/8" bowl gouge was not super sharp, I wanted to have it super sharp to do some nice light cuts on the tenon, so I stepped away from the lathe to sharpen the gouge, I was just about finished sharpening, when I heard a LOUD POP more like a bang really, but as it was an implosion I guess I'll have to go with "POP"........

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..........bad words were said......... :( :doh: :bang:
It looks like it gave way right along the cracks, on the CA glue joints..... :(

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The only good thing to come out of this is that I can clearly see that I have the wall thickness consistently thin, how thin.......?

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....I read that is 1.2 mm thin.

I guess I should have not tried the vacuum chuck, I should have used a long jam chuck :doh:

Oh well...... :rolleyes:

Vaughn, I'm sorry I did not get a nice piece out of the wood you sent me, that Red Eucalyptus was really nice, I see why you enjoy turning it, and the color and grain patterns were super too......

Cheers!

PS, I'm still looking for the tenon, I've not found that piece yet :huh: :dunno:
 
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Stu - sorry to see the HF blow up on you! You did an outstanding job on getting the walls so thin - I'm still working on 1/4"!! You've got quite the setup and seem to have everything sequenced so that the entire process really flows! Nice work - in spite of the blow up! Looking forward to the next one!
 
Stu...that lay off didn't affect your turning skills at all. To bad about the implosion...that sucks, yes pun intended. :wave:
 
Looks like it "might have been" nice. :D I had a mishap on a turning this weekend too.

I first posted a link about CA gluing sandpaper to a rubber finger a year or two ago. I received a lot of flack about showing something so dangerous from a few "geniuses". One nasty email from an "expert" too. Anyway, I still use the technique and I still have my fingers. But since then I decided to use a tip that is too big for my fingers so in the unlikely event that there is a catch the rubber finger will spin on my real finger.
 
Oh my goodness Stuart, this must give you a bad feeling, I guess you turned it a little bit to thin.
But as always, next time better.

Ad.
 
Stu,

Too bad it blew up, but I'm durned impressed by the wall thickness, and the consistency. Unbelievable skill must be involved, that kind of work is way beyond anything I can imagine... the piece was looking great. It's ironic that it blew up and *you weren't even touching it at the time*! ;)

The problem I've had with CA fixes is not so much that they break, but that when sanding or turning over CA, I either get a catch or, if sanding, a "bump" where the CA is, I guess because the CA is harder than the wood itself...

Thanks,

Bill
 
stu, looks like it was soooo close to a great hollow form...sorry about the bad luck. but you weren't hurt and your posting is another reminder to all of us to wear head and lung protection all the time. neat trick on the sanding. i've tried that with a rubberized glove with glued on sandpaper but the finger of the glove twists. will have to try the finger cot version.
 
Bummer. I didn't see this thread yesterday, but sorry to see the HF imploded on you. It was looking good right up to the point where it popped on you. I guess you could say you really popped the grain on this wood. :p

You sure did have this one nice and thin, though. I've noticed that about the only people who seem to care how thin a hollow form is are other woodturners. I have yet to hear a potential customer say "it looks wonderful, but I was looking for something a bit lighter in weight." I suspect other turners would pick up most of my pieces and think I should have lightened them up some more, but I'd rather have a slightly thicker HF in one piece than have a thin one in multiple pieces. :D
 
serves ya right,Stu...1.2 mm sheesh now if that was cm, I'd be right at home....amazing skill,Stu, and it just seems to get better all the time. Really sorry about the loss, the grain looked way too nice to lose, but thats the nature of the beast. Thanks for the pics
 
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