Crashmph
Member
Well this guy did it differently... Not me... just a post found on IMGUR. It is easier to see on the link.
My Girlfriend wanted a bowl for Christmas and i didn't have a lathe, so this is what i did. - Imgur
My Girlfriend wanted a bowl for Christmas and i didn't have a lathe, so this is what i did.
So my girlfriend and i decided to do home made presents this year for Christmas with a $40 limit, she also mentioned she wanted a bowl. So i went driving around one day and found some logs by the side of the road and i picked up this guy. I believe it is paperbark Birch.
It was freshly cut, unbelievably heavy and huge, so i had to make it a bit more manageable.
After getting it to size it was time to start chopping away.
This is the bottom of the bowl.
The top! Once i got to this point i was beginning to rethink my plan. There was a lot more meat to hog out than i anticipated.
It took quite a few hours to get to this point. I continued chipping away at it until i got to about a 1/2 inch thickness around. Then i broke out the sander and started smoothing it out.
Once i got to a point where i was semi-happy with the shape i still needed to dry out the wood. I didn't have a half a year or a kiln to quickly dry it, but i did have a microwave. I read about other people drying wood in there with mixed results so i thought i would give it a try. I began writing the weight down each time i microwaved it. It's hard to believe but when i was done this bowl lost half its weight in water. It only had about one or two hairline cracks also, which i filled with gorilla glue epoxy ( it's clear and dries very well.
here it is after final sanding and finishing. I used Danish oil and wax to seal it.
It's not perfect, but it's a bowl.
Sorry these pictures aren't so great. I hastily took them.
I don't know how many hours this took, and frankly i don't want to know, but love makes you do some strange things, even carve a bowl out of a log you found on the side of the road for your sweetheart. Anyways, next time, i'm buying a lathe...
My Girlfriend wanted a bowl for Christmas and i didn't have a lathe, so this is what i did. - Imgur
My Girlfriend wanted a bowl for Christmas and i didn't have a lathe, so this is what i did.
So my girlfriend and i decided to do home made presents this year for Christmas with a $40 limit, she also mentioned she wanted a bowl. So i went driving around one day and found some logs by the side of the road and i picked up this guy. I believe it is paperbark Birch.
It was freshly cut, unbelievably heavy and huge, so i had to make it a bit more manageable.
After getting it to size it was time to start chopping away.
This is the bottom of the bowl.
The top! Once i got to this point i was beginning to rethink my plan. There was a lot more meat to hog out than i anticipated.
It took quite a few hours to get to this point. I continued chipping away at it until i got to about a 1/2 inch thickness around. Then i broke out the sander and started smoothing it out.
Once i got to a point where i was semi-happy with the shape i still needed to dry out the wood. I didn't have a half a year or a kiln to quickly dry it, but i did have a microwave. I read about other people drying wood in there with mixed results so i thought i would give it a try. I began writing the weight down each time i microwaved it. It's hard to believe but when i was done this bowl lost half its weight in water. It only had about one or two hairline cracks also, which i filled with gorilla glue epoxy ( it's clear and dries very well.
here it is after final sanding and finishing. I used Danish oil and wax to seal it.
It's not perfect, but it's a bowl.
Sorry these pictures aren't so great. I hastily took them.
I don't know how many hours this took, and frankly i don't want to know, but love makes you do some strange things, even carve a bowl out of a log you found on the side of the road for your sweetheart. Anyways, next time, i'm buying a lathe...
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