Drinking Bowl

Hi Everyone,
Im going to make a small drinking bowl based on the drinking bowls used in medieval Europe for a young friend who studies the history of the continent :). Ill be downstairs in the shop later this afternoon to assemble and glue up a bowl blank out of some scrap lumber in my wood pile. So drop by this evening and lets start a new project.
More later,
VW

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Next Project The Drinking Bowl Discussion and Plans

Hi Everyone,
As I mentioned in my earlier post, our next project will be a drinking bowl.
Now, what is a drinking bowl?
In the Middle Ages and probably earlier, Northern Europe and the British Isles made their kitchenware out of wood and it seems from relics that have been recovered, most people used bowls for eating and drinking. These areas also had a long tradition of wood turning on pole lathes, a lathe that utilized the natural springiness of tree saplings to power a lathe (there are many pole turners on the Internet and one of the better known is a gentleman named Robin Wood, who is located in the UK. He makes a living turning bowls and plates and other stuff with a pole lathe and you can see how he does this by going to YouTube and searching for Robin Wood Bowls. He has a series of videos that show how this is done). Since very few people owned tables at this point most bowls had a very rounded shape so people could hold them comfortably in their hands. Contrast this with bowls that are produced in contemporary times- these bowls have a much flatter shape with a wide foot. This is because these modern bowls are designed to be used on a table.
See this photo:

The dark blue bowl has a much wider foot than the light blue bowl and its the design of the light blue bowl that were going to try to emulate:

So heres what were going to do: Well go down to the workshop and get some scrap red birch and some scrap mahogany and mark it for cutting:

Since our light blue bowl is about 5 inches in diameter, well cut out our blanks about 6 inches in diameter:

Next, well coat them well with Titebond glue and stack them together. Im going to place the mahogany blank on the top so the bowl will have a dark red rim:

And lastly well clamp them together:

Hmmmm.....this looks like a large wood cookie with glue for icing.
The label on the glue bottle says to leave this clamped for 24 hours so well come back tomorrow evening and take the clamps off and see how were doing. If all is well well place it on the lathe and begin turning a small drinking bowl similar to the light blue bowl in the photo. Red birch and mahogany both turn very cleanly so Im anticipating a nice present for my friend.
See you tomorrow,
VW

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The Drinking Bowl Turning the bowl

Selasa, 09 Februari 2016

Hi Everyone,
Well, I went downstairs and took a look at the bowl blank...

...and I decided to take it and put a small faceplate on the bottom and turn it. And you can see the set up here:

As I indicated yesterday the mahogany layer will form the rim of the bowl so that is the top and the bottom layer of red birch is the bottom layer. Ill cut the foot of the bowl from this layer in a minute or so.
I began the turning of the outer surface of the bowl and after several minutes of turning, here is what it looked like:

...and you can see how smooth it is compared to the top photo.
Now Ill flip the bowl around and finish the outside and the foot of the bowl. Here we are after several more minutes of cutting. You can see how smoothly cut the exterior is and you can also see the rounded shape like the light blue bowl in my previous posting:

Time to flip it over one more time and begin hollowing it out. You can see that Ive left a cone-shaped section in the center. This cone helps to steady the bowl while its being turned:

In the above picture you can see how Ive cut into the next, lighter layer of birch.
Here is the bowl after about 10 minutes more turning:

You can see how the bowl is deeper and the cone is smaller. I went ahead and cut the bowl down more deeply and I thinned out the walls of the bowl:

Ive smoothed the walls of the bowl and rounded the edges of the rim--see how the mahogany turned out?
Im going to stop here for now and contemplate--should I deepen the bowl some more? If I do I run the risk of cutting into the metal screws that hold the bowl on the faceplate. This could damage my tools and leave holes in the bottom of the bowl. Deepening the bowl will increase the volume of the bowl and it will look better. So what to do-leave it or take a chance?
Come back later and find out!
VW

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The Drinking Bowl Turning the bowl pt 2

Minggu, 31 Januari 2016

Hi Everyone,
Well, I went down to the work shop and took a long look at the bowl and did a little measuring as well and it turned out that there wasnt a lot of wood left between the ends of the screw holes and the bottom of the inside of the bowl. So I turned the bottom more convex a couple of millimeters. This deepened the bowl, improved the appearance, and added a little more volume. Heres what it looked like immediately afterwards:

And I decided to stop there. Its not worth the risk of cutting into the screws and ruining the bowl. I sanded and oiled it and here it is at present:

Im going to oil over the next several days and give it a beeswax finish at the end and polish it. Ill post more photos when its done.
VW

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