Carving a Pine End Grain Bowl

I am having so much fun with this chunk of wood that is a really dynamic piece of pie. And I can't believe how beautiful it is. I'm carving it out using Arbor Text Turbo scraper. This is a really cool tool. Now, before I talk too much about it, let's talk about the bowl. I didn't just start this right now. I did some work before you got here working on the outside, working on the inside. So let's have a look at what it took to get to this point. Here's the 20 inch diameter piece of pine. I started with a little over four inches thick. I love the outside shape on this log and I really want to keep that shape. I'm using the turbo scraper on the back of this bowl. First, I'm leaving a flat spot in the middle where it'll sit on the table and working on tapering down toward those cool lobed edges. Look at the amazing color that's being exposed so far, so good. Next, I put the sanding pad on the power carving unit and I start working on ferring the curve and taking out any tooling marks. I have as you would with any woodworking project, I'm taking this through a progression of grits with the back of the bowl done. It's time to start hollowing the inside. I'm back to the turbo scraper for this. And what I'd like to do is create a recess in the middle and basically create a bowl shape by making that recess bigger and bigger and bigger. Remember, this is all end grain I'm cutting and this is where the negative rate cutters really shine, removing all this material without tearing the heck out of that end grain. So let's talk about that turbo scraper. Here's what we've got going. These are carbides. So one benefit to that is that when a part of the cutter gets dull, all we have to do is loosen the bolt, turn it to a fresh edge, you're back in business. They're also negative rake. And it's a really big deal, especially in this application. You saw that stump. So the tree was growing this way, that means everything I'm cutting here and grain and grain. This is a bunch of soda straws coming straight at my face right now. So when we look at just the attributes of wood and its propensity to chip or tear, we know end grain is more difficult to cut effectively than long grain. So with a negative rate cutter like we have on the turbo scraper, it really excels at being able to work that end grain and keep it nice so that we don't have boatloads of sanding to do on this later. The other thing I really like about it is just the ease of control. It's very, very easy to manage your depth of cut, to manage the cut. You're making the shape you're creating. And that's a great way to make sure that you're getting the carving you want out of the work that you're doing a neat attribute of this cutter is when you look at the way it's made, we've got these wings. So one of the things that's cool about that is I can look through the cutter as I'm working and I can see my work. So let's check out that particular feature. So as I'm cutting, just watch for that space in between the cutter and the next cutter. Like I said, you'll be able to see through, so you can really see your work and then look too at that amazing surface finish in the pine and how smooth that is. Like I said earlier, very little sanding when we're done with this. Thanks to that negative rake on the end grain. So one way to think about the turbo scraper is it's very similar to what we would do with a hand scraper and a hand scraper is a tool you're gonna use on burls, curly material, birds, eye material to get a really good cut quality. Same thing here, we're emulating that type of cut with the turbo scraper. Now, obviously, one thing I can do with that is clear out a lot of wood like I'm doing on this big ball. But another application is an spoon work and dishing out that spoon because of the way the turbo scraper can get used on edge like that. Let me p pe up and I'll show you what a lovely cheat that is for making spoons that took that ball out so quickly, my job at this point is to go back to this, I've got some more material to take out so that it, it's a little more bow like. So I'm just gonna go back to the scraper. Keep on cutting pine out in order to finish up that pine bowl, I stuck with the turbo scraper and got a lot more material out of there really working down the wall thickness. And the way I monitor the wall thickness is by using bowl calipers. Once I was done with the Turbo scraper, then I switched to a sanding head and like you'd always do start with courts work your way up till fine. Once the sanding was done, best part of most projects getting finish on there and really seeing that beautiful wood grain pot. I love how it came out. I am really happy with this project. I love the pine and I love the way that the turbo scraper worked on this, that negative rake tool was really beneficial because of all the end grain that I was constantly working against. It really minimized the sanding time because it minimized the tear out and chipping. It was really a great choice for this piece of pie.