Avoiding explosive breakups on the lathe.....

[Odie]

In 43 years of turning bowls on a lathe, I've only had two in memory that have broken up. Both times there was a telltale sound that warned me that something was wrong, and I thankfully shut down before there were flying missiles! Now admittedly I don't usually turn rotten suspect pieces of wood, but those pieces that I do turn sometimes have some indication that there is possible danger......and I usually avoid the obviously problematic chunks of wood.

(This does not include the newbie experiences I've had when wood broke up on the lathe because of mishandling of tools. What I'm addressing here is wood that breaks up because of flaws in the wood itself.)

Now I have a question for the more experienced turners here who have had a breakup while turning. Do you remember hearing a telltale change in the sound that tells you something drastic was about to happen?

=o=

 

[john lucas]

I've been turning for 45vyears. Through a few off the lathe early on but I don't remember ever having a piece blow up. I don't turn crappy wood.

 

[Ron Solfest]

I remember hearing a small ‘tick’ an instant before a small bowl blew up on the Fourth of July, 2020 (appropriate 😊). I heard the tick right about the time I realized it had gotten thin enough that the shear scraping I went back in with just to clean up the curve was a bad idea, it created enough to force it out of round - **BANG**

The pieces of that bowl sit on top of a cabinet a few feet away from my lathe as a reminder…