I have been dabbling in turning for almost three years now, though not much at all in the summers. The first year was really just getting a sense of how a tool behaved on a spindle, getting the lathe into decent shape with new bearings, and getting over the fear factor. A few articles by Peter Galbert in Fine Woodworking got me motivated to start to get serious. In the second winter, I started to work on the roughing gouge and the skew chisel, working through Darlow's Fundamentals of Woodturning. I managed to get reasonably comfortable with using the skew to form a bead, and learned enough to make tool handles. Then I hit the first real barrier skill, sharpening a gouge. I am still working through that now, but I think I have come far enough to have a usable profile and edge - although not one that looks quite like the examples I am trying to use.
So, on to the next step, cutting coves with a detail gouge. Back down to the bottom of the learning curve we go. I have a set of 10 glued up spindles, cut with beads and filets as I worked through those exercises, and now I am starting into them. Probably should have taken a before and after photo, as some of the marks might already have been there.
Starting from 1 on the left, the first element I will need to work on is how much more awkward it feels to start a cut on the right side of the cove.
Big ugly catches. I thought gouges were supposed to be easy compared to the skew. I thought the left hand side was better, although the last cut did have a catch, but the right hand side was horrendous. Moving on to 2, I can tell I was a little more timid with shallower cuts, yet managed to have catches on both sides. One of them was gnarly enough to put a chip on the edge of the gouge, so I will need to re-establish the edge before the next session. However, it is far enough of the center that I thought I would do one last cove.
I had been having problems seeing quite where the bead began, so I lined that with a pencil. I don't think that catch just to the left of this cove was while cutting this one. For now, I just tried to focus on riding the bevel into initiating the cut cleanly, and trying to get a steady roll down for the shape. I vaguely recalled some discussion in Darlow's book about the path the gouge should follow, it felt like a slight upward movement made for a smoother cut. Overall, I think 3 shows some modest progress.
Conclusions from Round 1 - I thought it would be a little easier, but I definitely had a better feel for the tool. It is one of the more complex discussions in Darlow's book, so I am going to give it another patient pass now that I have some direct experience to use a reference point.
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