The first time I used a lathe was a green bowl turning class in October 2021 and that's how I got hooked. I bought a Rikon 70-220VSR, safety gear and a few tools and have dabbled with bowls, pens, snowmen, captive rings on goblets. I tried my first segmented bowl within the last few days and I really like how it came out. The base was a maple bowl blank from Woodcraft, the segments were cut from maple and red oak boards from a box store, and from a piece of walnut board from a friend. The walnut pieces were a slightly different thickness than the rest to start. My finished product is just over 7" diameter and 4" tall. I don't have a drum sander, so I used a 10" diameter piece of pine on my lathe headstock as a large disc sander and tried sanding each ring that way.
I used a bowl scraper on the interior and it was slow going, I don't own any carbide tools (yet). I do have a sharpening set-up and resharpened a few times. Just when I thought I had the interior nice and smooth, I'd hit another spot and get some tear out. I knew I had plenty of material thickness but felt I was starting to just chase down a rabbit hole. The last time I did that, I ended up going the funnel club. Finally I decided to call it a "win" for my first try.
I included some photos of the specific spots, and appreciate any advice from the this group. Most of these "design features" are between the bottom ring and the bowl blank and I'm wondering if I didn't get those two surfaces perfectly flat. Or, is this relatively common and next time I should just keep at it with the scraper. I've made perhaps six or eight bowls so far, this was my first attempt at a segmented bowl.
I used a bowl scraper on the interior and it was slow going, I don't own any carbide tools (yet). I do have a sharpening set-up and resharpened a few times. Just when I thought I had the interior nice and smooth, I'd hit another spot and get some tear out. I knew I had plenty of material thickness but felt I was starting to just chase down a rabbit hole. The last time I did that, I ended up going the funnel club. Finally I decided to call it a "win" for my first try.
I included some photos of the specific spots, and appreciate any advice from the this group. Most of these "design features" are between the bottom ring and the bowl blank and I'm wondering if I didn't get those two surfaces perfectly flat. Or, is this relatively common and next time I should just keep at it with the scraper. I've made perhaps six or eight bowls so far, this was my first attempt at a segmented bowl.
