On Sun, 14 Sep 2008 11:32:23 +0100, "john" wrote:

Hi all, I a have huge roughing gouge, trouble is it's not supposed to be
used for bowl blanks. Apparently it's not designed to cope with the
alternating "with the grain, against the grain" cutting. I know some
turners use them on bowls but the practice is said to be dangerous. Fine by
me, I'm all for safety. BUT, what 'do' I use to rough out a bowl blank?
Your comments would be appreciated.

Since Mr. Feltmate made me an Oland tool addict, I do use them for roughing, but
I also use a roughing gouge..

IMHO, the warnings about not using roughing gouges on "bowls" is because of the
weakness of the tang part of the tool and the chance of breaking it with a lot
of leverage..
Since I am a devout coward, I avoid any turning that involves strain or
leverage, so I feel fine with a roughing gouge..
I use a 2" RG for the real grunt work, then a 1" for the finer roughing..

A few things that I should make clear:

I don't use a RG to rough hollow, just to rough shape the outside and
flatten/true the face.. (what will be the bowl bottom when it's reversed)

I keep the tool rest VERY close to the work and NEVER extend the RG more than
1/2" over the rest..

I maintain a steeper cutting angle that I need, so that in case of a catch, the
gouge is pushed down my side of the rest, not brought tip-first between the wood
and rest... Funny thing happens when the tip goes down.. the handle goes UP and
you don't want to be in the way of it.. DAMHIKT

I would NOT try to hollow the bowl with a RG... that's what bowl gouges and
Oland tools are for..

OTOH, I started doing "faceplate" turning years before I had heard of such a
tool as a bowl gouge, and somehow lived through it.. ;-]


mac

Please remove splinters before emailing