desert boot and miltary theme

[preprius]

It took all year so far to choose and make a project.

Any shape can be a bowl.  So I decided to make a boot bowl.  More specifically a desert boot bowl.

 

Bowl:  Wood is from a free source of discarded wine aged oak slots.  I had to glue up 3 slots to make a boot.   The cactus is Baltic birch plywood with a really thinned down green acrylic paint.  The white oak slots were 0.3 inches thick so I needed a few rings around to make a decent height of a bowl.   White oak is a bit different than red oak in ways of grain structure.  The glue up of oak slots was bad because not all slats are the same thickness.   I don't have a planer so I attempted with palm sander.  Lot of work.  Hard to get a straight edge without a table saw. 

Anyway not having a perfectly flat wood to start with causes issues when gluing the rings together.   This bowl will NOT hold liquid.  I had to use baking soda mixed with saw dust any instant glue to fill in big gaps.   

The cactus had some really sharp turns.  I had to go very slow around the tight turns since I was using stack cut inlay technique the thickness was 0.55 inches.  With really tight turns I decided to use Pegas #1 mgt.   Some of my learnings from this site was to make super high tension on blades and go slow. 

General Finishes finish "Armor R Seal" was used.   I still have 2 more coats to make it shinier. 

 

Bottle stoppers:   Niles Bottle stoppers web site has a gallery of customer art work.  So I noticed that some of the turned pieces look like bombs and missiles.  Of course you get other ideas in the middle of a project.  So I came up with a play on words "Lets Get Bombed" and used that idea on 2 bottle stoppers.   There was no "bombers" on her gallery. 

Since these stoppers are used for alcohol consumption.  I had to play with words "How can you get bombed without a bomber" ?   So I had to make a B2 bottle stopper.   Oh your doing shots !!!!  Then the A10 is the best.    Ok someone else can make the AC130 gunship. Actually this would be a great theme for military bars.    

B2-  wood black walnut.   Armor R Seal for final finish.   Since this was a quick 1 day project.  I only did a silhoette.   I needed thickness to mount the bottle stopper.   Since you getting higher I wanted to point up.  So thickness on bottom does not match the actual thin wind trailing edge.

A10-  Red Oak shows some good grain that indicates wind around the wings. I should have made dowels for the engines.  But this was a quick get it done project.   Again thickness of the wood is needed for bottle stopper usage.

I don't drink but I can always find someone that likes the stoppers.

For once I already know what my next project is.  It will take a long while to make.  I only have weekends to play. And it will be something I have not done.  I know there will be re-starts.  My order of wood from "Cherokee woods" gets here tomorrow.  I am getting excited.

Me.

Mark Eason

 

[Joe W.]

Just when I think I've seen it all.

Very creative and original.

[daveww1]

very nice

[preprius]

18 hours ago, Joe W. said:

Just when I think I've seen it all.

Very creative and original.

Thank Joe.   This village has taught me well.   I am getting more comfortable doing bowls now.  Also you guys taught me inlay techniques.   Pretty good tips got me this far in 1 year.

 

[trackman]

Never heard of using baking soda with the sawdust. I just use yellow glue an mix in sawdust. 

[preprius]

7 minutes ago, trackman said:

Never heard of using baking soda with the sawdust. I just use yellow glue an mix in sawdust. 

Baking soda and CA glue set up really fast.  See youtube link below.   I read somewhere that if you do 50/50 mix with sawdust you gain working time.

 

 

[Joe W.]

23 hours ago, preprius said:

Baking soda and CA glue set up really fast.  See youtube link below. 

OMG!  That brings back memories of when I flew a Powered Paraglider and had to repair the carbon fiber propellor tips (after they contacted the frame housing while spinning).  It works great for filling in small cracks.  And if you need to fill a larger area, use micro glass beads for filler.  But beware - the micro glass beads are like talc powder, so wear a mask. 

Thanks for the memory. 

[rdatelle]

Those came out great. Love the boot.

[preprius]

Final note...

So with other messages and my observations here is some lessons learned...

1) Use good quality wood.  Try not to use glue ups.  

2) if you use glue ups then make sure the bottom and top is planed flat. Recycled wood takes effort.

3) reduce glue squeeze between slices.   Lots of youtube videos that show  technques.  I will try painters tape next project.  And less glue.

4)  Any shape can be a bowl. But sharp corners take extra effort for sanding. 

5)  I think I will try sanding 2 or 3 rings glued together instead of all rings at 1 time. 

6) wall thickness does not have to be minimum. 

7) And do not combine project topics into a single post.   Bowls and bottle stoppers should be separated with different posts.

8 .  always request critique. I hope this will increase the feedback so I can learn faster. 

9) pick a slow day to post so it show up on "all activity" longer. A technique for more feedback ?

Thanks @octoolguy for the messages and critique.

 

Me.

Mark Eason