Oak??? Hey Sonny

[dicklaxt1]

You said in one of your posts that you were going to glue up some oak for turning. I read an article somewhere ,where it said oak was not good for turning as it split to easily. They may have been talking about green ,i don't know but it seems to me seasoned oak would be ok.One of you experts jump in with the answer.

dick

[volleyheads]

Oak isn't too bad to turn, white is better than red generally. However, the better turning method is green, it is pretty tough stuff dry. At least that is how it has been for me. The key, as with any of the more troublesome woods is to use sharp, very sharp tools and keep re-sharpening them often throughout the process. Sharpening gets even more frequent with dry wood, than with the green/wet type.

Best Regards,

Bill

"If it is worth doing, it's worth overdoing"

[Sonny Edmonds]

Dick,
Haven't yet, still pondering it.
It might not work at all. If you ever try turning plywood you'll see real fast.
But I'm pondering my stickered stacks of little boards by the bandsaw.
The reason it hasn't come to fruitation is I have lots of other stuff to play with.
A chunk of dryed oak, with cracks, is on the face plate and I was playing with it last night. I cut the piece from a crotched piece of firewood. (Looking for unusual stuff therein.)
I believe it will wind up in the firewood anyway because of its cracks. But it was for learning purposes.
Mostly chips are produced (spindal gouge). I sharpened my scraper and kicked her up to 1800 RPM and got stringy shavings and a nice looking surface to peer into the figure of the wood.
Shut it down for dinner and never got back except to vacuum up the mess.
I don't believe I will go any further with that piece.
But if/when I go into the laminated wood, I am of a mind to try it with a small set where the grain end is outboard and another with the grain lengthwise to the bed.
I'll show you what I get (as long as it isn't bloody :) )

I do know I need a good 1/2" bowl gouge. My cheapie starter set is spindal stuff. Thanks to Bill I have the gouges identified now.
But I will and am getting by for now.
The maple was a cake walk compared to the oak.

I think I shall start at ground zero, my local tool store and go from there. Or internet order if that's a no go.

But things are turning in the shop. :)

:D

Sonny Edmonds
"Precision Firewood Specialist"
http://home.earthlink.net/~sonnypie/
God Bless America !

[volleyheads]

Sonny,

I just had two things to cover from your post. Using sharp tools and having a little practice, you can turn plywood very well. It is pretty tough on the edges and requires frequent sharpening, but it does work fine. The second thing was that the pieces you were referring to gluing up are called segmented turning. I have done some and will post pictures when I can (still working on that) It really is a lot of fun and surprisingly easy. Most segmented turning is done with the grain running tangentially to the form, to eliminate the difficulties associated with the end grain, but some is oriented that way to great results. I have included some pictures to describe what I mean. Give it a try it is really a fun thing to do, and it takes virtually no wood to make something quite large, the waste is relatively small.

[http://homepage.mac.com/gouge55/.Pic...le_Lotus2.jpg]
[http://homepage.mac.com/gouge55/.Pic...al_Spiral.jpg]
[http://www.turnedwood.com/images/bowl403a.jpg]
[http://www.geocities.com/turnerbprit...-0326_IMG.JPG]
[http://mypage.uniserve.ca/~c_delory/T0141.jpg]

or with the grain mounted radially:

[http://www.mintmuseum.org/mason/fina...u1-3final.jpg]
[http://www.mintmuseum.org/mason/fina...mph4final.jpg]
[http://www.mintmuseum.org/mason/fina...mph5final.jpg]
Best Regards,

Bill

"If it is worth doing, it's worth overdoing"

[carl civi]

Bill & sonny.Hi,Thats what i am interested in doing and if i get half as good as you Bill, I will be one happy camper.I`ve already done a couple of laminations with wood i had laying around just simple stuff but it looked complicated,the results looked good.Doing stuff like that keeps your wood working skills honed.Oh bill that Sorby gouge i have
is 3/4" and the flute is deep,but it never been sharpend yet.I think what i`ll do is join a club and ask someone if they would show me how for my first one. thanks carl

[Sonny Edmonds]

..even I can see the daylight through that 4th one. That ain't gonna hold no water.
Let's see,
first you run your scrap wood through a chipper, then you glue it back together, then you mount it up on your lathe, strop your tool, strop your chisels, turn it to shape, turn the inner diamention,
blow a hole in it, .......
you run your scrap wood through a chipper, then you glue it back together, then you mount it up on your lathe, strop your tool, strop your chisels, turn it to shape, turn the inner diamention,
blow a hole in it, .......
you run your scrap wood through a chipper, then you glue it back together, then you mount it up on your lathe, strop your tool, strop your chisels, turn it to shape, turn the inner diamention,
blow a hole in it, .......
run it through the chipper, glue it back together, then you mount it up on your lathe, then you strop your tool, then you strop your chisels, turn it to shape....... LOL :)

Stunning Bill, absolutely stunning!
It had crossed my mind to intermix spiecies, but those are truly works of art!
Of course I'm not bummed out about it, I see it as something to try and aspire too.
But I have my doughts my present tooling can suffice except to achieve the looping outlined above. :)

Longitujinal like in the grain running up and down from the base to the top? Or longitujinal like a belt?
I would venture to guess the possiblities are about endless and depends on the turner and the edge and fanese' to pull it off.
What do you use for glue? Anything special?

:D

Sonny Edmonds
"Precision Firewood Specialist"
http://home.earthlink.net/~sonnypie/
God Bless America !

[dicklaxt1]

Bill did you turn those??? If so absolutely beautiful,if not still beautiful. I am having a hard time visualizing the method of glue ups but you can bet your sweet bippy I'm going to learn how to do that....you think Sonny"s got hooked......I've got it so bad I just want to melt and run right out the end of my hooter.

dick

[volleyheads]

Carl,

I just wanted to make sure that no one thinks that what I have posed so far was created by me. The postings to this point have all been made by other talented artists. I have just posted either the picture or the link to show what I had been trying to talk about. I am still walking along behind the tracks left by the very talented turners that have preceded me. Some day soon I should be able to post some pictures of some of my stuff, but if you expect them to be anything like some of these pother pictures, you will be very disappointed. I am trying to learn as much as I can and get to their level, but that will be a long path that we all are on together.

Best Regards,

Bill

"If it is worth doing, it's worth overdoing"

[volleyheads]

Sonny,

I meant to be longitudinal like a belt, but you could do it either way. It is easier to assemble the belt way. As far as glue, the super duper secret glue of choice is (don't tell anybody) yellow wood glue. Try to keep these high tech trade secrets hush hush. The glue works very well since it develops a slight tack pretty quickly.

Best Regards,

Bill

"If it is worth doing, it's worth overdoing"

[volleyheads]

For solid turnings. the best site I've seen is Kevin Neeley's which is at http://www.turnedwood.com/ . For the open segmented forms, they are much simpler to make. A pretty good explanation of how to do these would be at a link I can't seem to find right now, sorry. I can send you some instructions etc and (when I get a chance) even a sample piece glued up to play with, once I get to making the (very simple, but ingenious) jig I haven't made yet.

Best Regards,

Bill

"If it is worth doing, it's worth overdoing"