Elm Box
Just about a year ago, Marisa got me a box turning class at Woodcraft in Indianapolis. Now I’ve been turning for about 10 years now, but it’s all been self taught, and learning some new techniques from a pro would probably be a good thing. Well, it was.
The class was taught by a professional turner named Jim Dupler. I learned a lot of good information, and made this box in the two day class.
I believe he said the wood was elm, just some scraps he happend to have laying around.
Elm Box
It was a lot of fun making this box, but for whatever reason, I waited almost a whole year before trying my hand at another.
I had a small piece of black palm left over from another small turning project, so I thought I’d try another box. The block wasn’t big enough to make a lid also, so I just made the box.
Black Palm Box
It turned out pretty good.
Black Palm Box
So next, I had a small block of something, it was pinkish red.
Lidded Box
I was able to make this one lidded.
Lidded Box
Turned out pretty well.
I followed your instructions and made the carbide hollowing tool. I bought a cheap one that had a golf club handle and I could never control it so I made your version. My question is, both of these tools had such violent catches that the bowl was ripped from the jaws. I’ve tried different angles, but the tool always catches, and some are doozies.
Is this operator error or is the tool just not right for the job?
Thanks,
Jim
Boy, I don’t know, I’ve never had really bad catches with it. I don’t use a whole lot of force presenting them to the wood. Plus I keep the tail stock up against the bowl for most of it. When the tail stock is removed, I make really light cuts. I’m pretty paranoid about that as I have had some bad catches using regular scrapers and bowl gouges. I recently turned a 9″ natural edge bowl completely with that hollowing tool, and it turned out very nice.