Beautiful turning William! Great contrast and finish! A couple of questions for you though... #1. Were they difficult to turn since they are fairly different woods (i.e.; hardness, etc.)? #2. Did you have any problem turning the yellow cedar? I understand that it is somewhat 'hazardous' to carve and turn. Did you use special breathing apparatus or? I have a nice size block of yellow cedar recently given to me and wondered about trying to turn it... Thanks in advance and thanks for sharing! Safe turning to you!
To save myself some typing time here is a quote of my answer in my own site to similar questions as yours .
That yellow cedar seems to be a lot harder than other species of cedar and it also has a very tight grain compared to other cedars so there was no problem sanding . Only problem with yellow cedar is it has a very strong smell like whacky tabacky . . .lol . . . Too bad it is so scarce around here but it sure was nice of that guy to give me that six foot long by one and a quarter inch thick board of it . I made one all yellow cedar bowl from it as shown and will keep the rest for accent work as shown here in order to stretch out its usefulness .
I actually timed my sanding on those four and it took four and a half minutes for each one from taking them out of the ring press to putting them on the lathe and sanding down in steps from 100 grit to 400 grit and burnished with synthetic steel wool .
Those four will probably go fairly quickly at my next craft sale on Saturday for $29.00 each
It is not hazardous that I am aware of and I just use a dust mask as well as my DC and it cuts shiny smooth with sharp tools . . I did not turn them from a block of wood . They are made from a series of rings cut out on the Ringmaster Lathe . Just a couple hand full's of shavings per bowl . What a shame if you are going to hog out the insides of a block of that beautiful yellow cedar wood to make your bowl . Mine are all made from a flat board so there is very little waste .
I hope you will show a picture f yours when you get it done .
One thing to be aware of with it is that if you are going to be turning very much of it , it's best to shower and change clothes before heading to a coffee shop or people might look at you 'funny' from the smell :biggrin:
