A DEEP CLEAN

I thoroughly enjoyed a day of play and fun all day.  These are the first Rain Lilies to open!  If we get a good rain, there are many other areas of deep red that will bloom, too.

In betweent the major cleaning jobs, I played with the bowl on the lathe.  

I had some more CA glue work to do--you can bet I was geared up!  Most of the pithy wood was turned away so the bowl was all solid wood inside!

I worked the outside edge first and then hollowed out the center which is left to help keep the spinning bowl (500rpms) balanced.

  It worked well and I was excited to see the bowl emerge!

I did have some cracks along the edge that needed a bit of filler again.  I let it harden overnight and will do some sanding today.  I hope to get the first layer of finish on it even!

I ended the day with a major clean-up of the floor!  There are a lot of wood chips when turning a large bowl!  The hickory is very dense but yields beautiful work!  

 

WOOD ON WEDNESDAY

This is a very large bowl--the piece of wood was so heavy, Bill had to carry it and put it on the lathe for me!  The wood is very complex but it is very hard and so it means a LOT of sharpening of the tools very often!  The wood did have a very large void that went deeply into the bowl so it would be a problem when I had to hollow out the inside.

So I mixed up some Terra Cotta colored two-part putty and filled the cracks and holes so that I can sand the outside, put on some finish and then turn the bowl about to hollow out the inside! 

 It feels good to be standing at the lathe again!  

 

PLAYED IN EVERY ROOM

I've started a new watercolor...no tutor on this one-all on my own.  I do love the drawing step a lot.

I cut a bunch of blocks and sewed them together--only three more rows to go!  I ran out of design wall room so I put the first five rows aside to keep going!  The end is in sight!  

I had to work hard to get the 'log' onto the lathe-I  had to use a tool to get a level spot to put the 'faceplate ' screwed in place--of course, the drill's battery died midway through and I had to wait for it to charge!  Then I had to cut the corners of the log off with the  reciprocating saw because it was too big for my bandsaw and Bill wasn't home to use the chainsaw!  

It took forever to get the 'log' round but I did it and even made the tenon (this is the bottom of the bowl) and I will be holding this tenon in the chuck so I can then hollow out the bowl portion.

There are some punky spots in the wood so a good coat of shellac overnight will harden these spongy spots so that I can sand the outside of the bowl before I turn it around.  The grain is impressive--I'm excited about that!  The wood is a hardwood and that means that I have to sharpen my bowl gouge often!  I'm looking forward to what I tackle today!

 

LOG PREPARATION

This is what I will be playing with today;  a large piece of Hickory.  It was also cut for firewood and given to Bill to use.  He hadn't used it and thought I might enjoy a new kind of wood to turn at the lathe!  Oh, yes, please!  It is the largest piece yet but needs some preparation before I can mount it on the lathe.

The wood has been outside so it needed some drying out.  It also need to have the bark removed so I have been chipping away the bark which has absorbed the rain like a sponge!  I will smooth the center of the flat side so that I can screw the faceplate in place which will then screw onto the lathe.  I also need to cut off the corners to on the bandsaw so that it will shape up a bit easier.  I am still working on enjoying every step of my projects...