A piece of wood from a friend’s property near Santa Fe, this Russian olive grew fast, and the early-wood is very soft and porous. Also, this particular chunk of trunk had multiple branches sticking out, so I figured it would have some wacky grain.
The bowl was rough-turned, then I walked away from it for a few weeks. When I came back, it had cracked while still in the chuck, so I stabilized it with thin CA glue. I think there’s most of an ounce (30ml) of thin CA in this piece, stabilizing tricky spots and that crack.
Once it was stable, I turned the rim, then carved the chevrons on the rim. Then mounted the bowl in the Cole jaws and turned off the tenon and finished the bottom / outside, which I think looks pretty good. I’m less happy with the inside, and need to remember to use a card scraper to finish the inside. It would be the perfect technique for this Russian olive.
Diameter is between 8-9 inches. Maybe a bit over 20cm. Finish is mostly shellac, with just enough BLO/tung oil to keep things smooth while turning. There’s also a few coats of Ack’s Finishing Paste (which is mostly carnauba wax).
Jim, I probably turned 90% of it away, too. Repeated applications of CA on the crack, on end-grain that wanted to fuzz in spite of tools freshly sharpened, and what-not. But the 1oz bottle started pretty close to full, ended pretty close to empty, and I only got a few drops on me.
Very nice bowl Dave, all aspects of this work - the turning, the carving, and of course the beautiful grain - add nicely to the finished project. Did thr knots give you any trouble?
Mike, yeah, a lot of glue, but I guess it was worth it.
Dave, it’s Russian olive, so a different genus, even. But yeah, there’s some pretty in there if you can get to it without blowing up the piece or losing chunks to tear-out.
Thanks, Tom. The knots were part of the challenge, but mostly I treated them as any other end-grain and made sure my tools were sharp and that I had reinforced that grain with the glue.
