(up-tempo country-rock music) - Greetings, welcome to The American Woodshop.

I'm Scott Phillips, and today we're going to do turning out of firewood.

How do you do it?

Well, stick around.

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(mid-tempo rock beat) - If you're a woodworker, it's all about the wood.

And we're doing turning today.

And what are my five favorite woods?

It's easy.

Walnut, from the firewood pile.

Gotta be careful of that spider that's in there, but look at that.

We've got sapwood and heartwood.

I like cherry, butternut, hard maple, and any fruit wood, especially if it has spalting in it.

Let's go see what we can turn out out this.

(transition effect) This is called greenwood turning, and that means the moisture content on this piece right now is riding right around 30%.

And how do you stabilize it?

Well, more on that when we turn it.

But, what I'm doing is taking the width, which is 12 and a quarter, and I use blue painter's tape, and I laid out a section, 12 and a quarter, so this is going to create kind of a square.

Only the bark on it.

And the column is locked.

I'm using a three-quarter inch blade, this is a straight cut.

And I'm gonna leave it that way.

Yeah, I'm not gonna cut it into a round blank, because we're going to turn this with four irregular edges.

So, and we're gonna make this bark show off.

And that's one of the beauties of turning greenwood.

You can do anything you want to do.

So, the bandsaw has a half, or a three-quarter inch blade on it.

Let's make that cut.

Whatever you do, be sure to read, understand and follow the instructions that come with the tools and products you use in your wood shop.

Work safely.

Let's make that cut.

Let it come up to speed, and I'm going to slab this off, being careful to come right along the edge of that blue painter's tape.

Give that blade plenty of time to carry away the sawdust.

Now that's a perfect cut.

And there was no drift on that.

If you are having trouble with your bandsaw, get a good blade on it.

And add plenty of tension.

Now, we'll cut this square, and then we're going to check it for end checks.

That's why we're trimming off these ends right here.

Turn that off.

Okay, and that's off.

We use the break to let it come to a stop.

And that's got a really cool piece of heartwood in it.

Have a broken edge here.

I'll use it, well, boy that's gonna make it challenging.

I'm going to have to rip this broken edge off before we chuck that up on the lathe and square this up.

Gotta read the wood.

And I'll just do that free-hand.

From here, it's over to the wood lathe.

(transition effect) Greenwood turning is so much fun.

And, what I'm going to do is leave the four corners on this work piece, and reverse-chuck this.

What that means is I need to chisel open a place right here that I can mount a faceplate, and I need to get through this bark that really doesn't have any strength to it, so I can drive the two-inch number 12's fully-threaded wood screws down into the wood.

That's to make it safe.

Now, the preparation is key here.

And I also saw where the bark is a little bit loose in a couple places, and I'll use some thick-viscosity superglue to... Oh, that's perfect right there.

So now what I'll do is mount the faceplate with two-inch long screws, eight of them.

And then, once this is mounted, I can spin it on this drive spur of the lathe and start it out the lowest speed setting.

I'll get that done.

Now that's solid, that's not going anywhere.

And since this is going to be a little out of balance as we start this out, as I spin this up on the head stock, and there's a lock right here so that the quill locks in so I can lock that heavy-duty faceplate on there.

Then what I will do is tighten this down with the Allen so the force will not spin this off.

I'll get that tight, and, then I'll bring up the tailstock with the live ball-bearing center.

And, we'll be in good shape.

Pays to get this secure, because what's going to happen now is that's all locked in place, and we're going to turn a spigot, which is this big knob that these jaws will close down on, and then we can reverse this, take the faceplate off, and we can hollow the bark side, which will look really cool.

So, have to move the banjo up with the tool rest, and bring it back far enough that when I spin this, it clears.

Just like that, and now, I bring up the tailstock.

Lock it in place.

Unlock the ram.

And I bring the live ball-bearing center up, because I want to capture this workpiece in a way that it can't possibly go anywhere as I turn that spigot down.

Okay, that's locked in, right now.

That looks good.

And, we'll turn this on at the lowest speed setting.

Everything's locked and looking good.

Lowest speed setting.

And we can dial it up until it starts to wobble, dial it back a bit.

And now what I'll do is use a bowl gouge, half inch, and I'll start by working the bevel flat to the wood, right in here.

Okay, so I rub the bevel of the gouge to the wood, and I start to make a cut well away from the outside points of the square.

I don't want to grab into those points.

What I'm going for is a foot that I can mount the four-jawed chuck around.

Once I get this balanced a bit, I can dial up the speed.

The other thing is, I know that I can rotate that tool rest in, and the banjo up, and that's going to give me more control.

The closer you keep this edge to the spinning workpiece without the two touching, the better.

And that's locked in, that's good.

Okay, so now, we'll make that foot.

And the foot needs to be an inch long, and three-and-a-half inches in diameter.

Now, when I approach the outside of this irregular-edge workpiece, I have to use this hand, my fulcrum hand, to hold this chisel securely to the workpiece so that the chisel doesn't jam into the voids.

And I like to take no more than an eighth of an inch off in each pass.

And what I'm trying to do is get it nice and balanced as I create that spigot, so the jaws will hold it.

Can you see this, the shadow?

You can see straight through it.

As I bring that up to turn it, I just barely make contact.

And then, I press the chisel down to the tool rest, and I advance it towards the center.

Everyone has a different technique.

This is the way I'm comfortable doing shadow turning.

(transition effect) This is the tricky part, right in here.

Don't get greedy, take super light cuts, and finish the cut all the way out.

Because if you don't, things won't be balanced.

So I'm going to continue to work this down.

This is the bottom of the bowl.

And what we're doing is turning a spigot on the very bottom of the bowl.

It's going to be three-and-a-half inches.

And, that's about it right there.

Let's turn that off and do a check by eye.

That's just about perfect, so I'll continue to work these edges up.

Since this is the bottom, I want these square points to sweep up a bit.

And, wherever the bark has started to lift, you want to use thick-viscosity super-glues, cyanoacrylate adhesive.

Let it work in there and spray the activator on there.

Or better yet, let it dry on its own overnight.

That way, you'll get a stronger bond.

So, let's get this worked down.

And I'm running right around 350 right now.

Now there's another chisel we can use here.

And, you see the type of shavings we're getting.

I'm going to go to a round carbide cutter.

And when I do that, I have to turn that off, because the cutter should be right at, or slightly above center line, I want you to see this, because in real difficult grain positions, this is an excellent tool to use.

You do have to be very careful of that outside edge.

Okay, now watch.

These are great tools.

The cool thing about this one is that it has interchangeable shanks, so you release that chuck.

What I can do is bring up another point that gives me the ability to create that shoulder for the four-jawed chuck.

Again, that's a carbide cutter.

And what that will do now is give me the finished form of what the shape of the spigot will be.

Get a much smoother cut now that it's starting to get balanced.

Makes a world of difference.

We'll just keeping working this form down until I can form this spigot.

This handle was nice and long for a reason.

It's to be used as a three-point grip.

One point's to your body.

The other is the control hand, which controls the bevel and the cutting edge, and how they kiss the wood at the same time.

This is a technique I learned from Rudy Asalnick back in the eighties.

Changed my life because he did a super-smooth cut using the chisel this way.

Okay, let's turn it off and see what we have, because it's going to be a very unusual form.

Oh yeah, I like that.

I need to go just a little bit more, and then create that spigot, and then we can reverse it.

And it's really important to make sure everything's secure and everything's well-balanced.

That's good.

I'm really getting a lot of that glue up, that's soaked deep.

Let me hit this with stabilizer, and we're gonna let that cure for, oh, half an hour.

(coughs) Because that glue soaks down in there, you don't want that flying out.

It's one of the main reasons you wear a face shield.

You certainly don't want anything flying up in your face.

Especially glue.

(transition effect) And this is where you want to have sharp chisels, and slow the way heck down on your cuts.

Make sure you continue to rub that bevel, all the white never getting this chisel in a bind.

And now, I'm going to swap out cutters on this chisel, and I'm going to this diamond-point cutter.

And here's why, it's locked in.

Watch what I'm doing.

I'm undercutting that foot ever-so-slightly, making a bit of a dovetail.

I'm gonna go in a little bit further, and that's so the four-jawed chuck will fit on that.

Just like that, right there.

Never let that get into a bind.

Okay, that looks good.

Now, we can flip that around, close these jaws down on that foot, and take the faceplate off.

(transition effect) So, now we put the spigot in the jaws of the chuck, pressing it flat to the bottom of the bowl when it's tight.

Roll it around to the other side.

Advance the jaws.

Make sure that it has a firm purchase.

Remember, that spigot is tapered ever-so-slightly, and that means it's not coming out.

And now, I'll bring the tailstock forward, and advance the ram to help support that.

I have clearance as I lock the tool rest and the banjo.

Boy-that woulda been bad.

That's what you rotate it.

You don't want anything touching.

And now, what I'll do is use the bowl gouge.

Drop that just a bit to hollow this form, keeping the bark.

And then I'll also go to the round cutter as well, but I'll use this to get things started.

Remember, the key is, in shadow turning, hold that chisel securely to that tool rest as you start your cut.

Can't wait to see this.

Come down to the wood, and do that delicate outside edge.

Oh there we go.

We're through the bark, and we're down to the wood.

Take a lighter cut there, until I work through that rough spot.

I keep that live ball-bearing center there as long as I can.

When it's in the way, that's when I move it.

(transition effect) I'll go back to the round cutter, and continue to work this down now.

And I want to stay on that edge of the bark.

Don't get greedy, and with the round cutter, you can go uphill, you can go downhill.

The main thing is, take light cuts.

Look at those ribbons of wood just floating away.

That's the joy of turning right there.

Now we're down into the heartwood.

Whoo boy, love that color.

And before I go too deep, I'll turn that off, and oh yeah, that's magic.

Now what I can do is hollow the sides out a bit more, and then establish the depth by siding along.

Okay, I need to go down a half-an-inch deeper.

I can just use the chisel to determine that.

And then, we can hollow out the hardwood, not the bark, and then it'll be on to finishing.

This is looking really good.

Let it come up to speed.

Take a bit deeper.

I can hear that it's actually starting to get thin.

Listen to the wood; it'll tell you what it's doing.

Whoa, there it's really thin.

I'll want to be careful about that.

Right in here, I want to use a special cutter, to, very carefully, that's a small carbide cutter, undercut this lip just a little bit.

And, that will make it more intriguing.

Make it more like a... Even though this is an open bowl, that little detail of the undercut can really make it look great.

And then, with the dust collector, I will make sure that I sand this down very carefully, and keep that bark edge.

The sanding friction will make it nice and thin.

(transition effect) The sanding friction alone dried this bowl out, and it is nice and thin.

And this is food safe, and all natural walnut oil.

And I love this on walnut.

It really is the best way to use this, because it's great for any application, whether you want to use it for food presentation, or, just as a work of art.

That's up to you.

Then I'll brush this into the bark as well.

And once we get that done, we'll take a look at the finished piece.

(transition effect) So, the moment of truth.

This comes off the four-jawed chuck.

There's that spigot.

And, this walnut oil is still drying.

And it will soak in and push that moisture out, and that's why I like to use it on greenwood turnings (mid-tempo music) of the right species.

And I love that live-edge look.

And that's just graceful.

I mean, it's not for everyone, but it fits my soul.

For whatever you do, take up turning.

Wood turning is so much fun, it's easy to do, it's not a mystic, lost art, and, make it your own.

So that's it.

Now, go have some fun in your wood shop.

See you next week in The American Woodshop.

Yeah, that's very graceful.

(classical music) - [Narrator] Woodcraft, since 1928.

Providing traditional and modern woodworking tools and supplies to generations of craftsmen.

Woodcraft: Helping you make wood work.

(mid-tempo music) - [Narrator] Pro tools for tool pros.

Rikon tools.

- [Narrator] Woodcraft Magazine: projects, plans, and web links designed to help you make wood work.

- [Narrator] PS Wood, home of Timber Wolf's Swedish silicon-steel bandsaw blades, and super-sharp scroll-saw blades.

(mid-tempo music) - [Narrator] A bed to sleep on.

A table to share meals.

A house that feels like a home.

The Furniture Bank of Central Ohio: Providing furniture to neighbors in need.

(mid-tempo rock beat) (up-tempo country-rock music) - For more information on tips behind The American Woodshop, and to watch free episodes 24/7, check us out online, and like us on Facebook.

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