Guest Authored By: Steve Staley

Recently, I made two natural edged bowls from very different woods and had very different experiences and results as a consequence.  The process of making a natural edge bowl is one that most wood turners are at least nominally familiar with and the basics of the process don’t change a great deal with the diameter or depth of the bowl.  However, the choice of species of wood and the condition of the particular piece of wood chosen can have an enormous impact on the methods employed and on the ease of the overall process to say nothing of the outcome of the final piece.

Wood #1: Raywood Ash

I chose to make the first bowl from a piece of Raywood Ash.  The Raywood Ash, or Claret Ash, is a seedling variant of the Caucasian Ash (Fraxinus angustifolia subsp. oxycarpa).  This variant was originally discovered near a tree nursery in South Australia in the early 20^th century.  The first specimen trees were grown at the nearby property of Raywood, which is the origin of the common name of the tree.  The tree was later introduced as an ornamental species to the British Isles.  The tree was introduced to North America in the 1950s but didn’t become widely available until the late 1970s.

The tree can grow to a height of 45 to 60 feet and its dense dark green leaves turn to a dark claret red (the origin of the second common name) in the fall.  The colorful fall display combined with a dense shade character in the hotter months made this an ideal tree to plant near the dog kennel at my central California home.  The tree was very successful for approximately 30 years until it was felled in a wind storm.  Thankfully, the falling tree missed both the garage and kennel roofs.  It is likely that the tree was weakened by increasing temperatures and possible infection with the fungus Botryosphaeria.  Regardless of the reasons for its failure, I wanted to preserve a piece of a yard tree that had been a part of the family for several decades, so I asked the tree removal professional to leave me some pieces suitable for drying and turning.

Preparing the Wood for Turning

Raywood Ash is not a timber tree and I have never read of anyone else having experience with turning the wood.  Obviously, the wood was very green when it was first felled, so I coated the exposed ends with paraffin and allowed it dry for several months before attempting to work with it.  My method for determining the dryness of a piece of wood I intend to turn is to weigh it immediately upon acquisition and then to compare representative weights taken approximately monthly.  I have found an old postal scale to be adequate for this task.  Once there is less than 5% relative weight loss between two readings I feel comfortable with starting the turning process, knowing that if the wood proves to still be quite moist, I can always reseal with a product such as Pentracryl, Anchorseal, or paraffin, or I can dry the partially turned item in a paper bag with some of the shavings from the early stages of the turning process.  The piece of ash I elected to work with proved to be sufficiently dry.

Turning the Raywood Ash

I turned the piece on my NOVA DVR XP lathe using fingernail and regular bowl gouges along with a round nose scraper.  All of the turning tools were of Robert Sorby manufacture, a brand that has consistently proven its worth.  I favor using bowl gouges even for roughing work over roughing gouges and even over the specially made tools designed for roughing out bowls that are on the market today.  I assume it is a side effect of learning to turn long before such specialty items existed!  I prefer to use my Nova G3 chuck fitted with 50mm jaws in the expansion position for mounting the work piece.  I finished the rear of the bowl using the Cole Jaw set in the compression position.

The process was essentially textbook with no major issues.  The Raywood Ash proved to be a relatively easy wood to turn, cutting smoothly and continuously.  The only places that required assistance were with parts of the natural bark edge that I secured with cyanoacrylate to ensure adhesion, however, approximately one quarter of the original bark did not remain in situ by the end of the process.  A regular multi-step sanding process was used followed by a light application of Minwax Colonial Maple stain to highlight the grain pattern in the otherwise very light wood and finished with a coat of Behlen Woodturner’s Finish.

The End Product of Raywood Ash

I was very pleased with the finished product and especially pleased with the sharp contrast between the blond heart and sapwood compared to the walnut brown of the remaining natural bark edge.  I was also fortunate to have a nice grain pattern in the interior of the finished piece that includes the dense stippling that I have observed in specimens of ash aside from the Raywood cultivar.

Wood #2: Manzanita Burl

The second bowl was made from a specimen of Manzanita burlwood that was given to me by my son, Matthew, as a Christmas present.  This piece was mostly dry when I received it, but I verified this through the aforementioned weighing process.  Unfortunately, I failed to take photographs before starting, or during the turning itself, so the photos are limited to the finished products.  I do however have a representative sample of Manzanita burlwood that I have not turned yet which is very similar in shape, size, and character to the piece I began with.

All About Manzanita

Manzanita is a common name for many species of the genus Arctostaphylos.  The evergreen shurbs occur in chaparral areas ranging from southern British Columbia south to northern and central Mexico.  They are especially prominent in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, where I lived with my family for a number of years in the 1960s and 70s.  It was this period of his youth that gave my son the idea to obtain Manzanita samples for turning.

Manzanita shrubs have smooth, orange or red, bark and stiff, twisting branches.  The word manzanita is Spanish and refers to the berries borne by the shrubs which resemble very small apples.  Manzanita may also be mistakenly used to refer to the Madrone tree which is actually a species of Arubtus.

Manzanita has medical, culinary, and decorative uses but the shrub is not generally used as a timber because of its tendency to invariably crack against the grain.  The wood is also not usually available in large sizes due to the slow growing nature of the shrub and its tendency to branch prolifically instead of growing thick trunks or branches.  This is somewhat unfortunate given the natural beauty of the wood which ranges from light orange in the sapwood to a dark ruby red in the heartwood.

To my knowledge, Manzanita wood isn’t generally sold by lumber or turning blank supply houses, but it is often relatively easy to find on Ebay and other auction sites.  Be sure to be very clear about what you are buying as most Manzanita sold on-line is NOT suitable for turning, usually being small branches intended for arts, crafts, bird perches, and aquarium use.

My Particular Manzanita Burl

The piece I was working with was a burl; it was of a good size and had been pre-rounded for use as a turning blank.  But immediately I was faced with several problems.  The first issue was how to mount it.  I wanted to preserve the rough surface for the natural edge but it was too rough for a face plate.  I attempted to use a screw chuck, but the wood was very friable and unstable with a significant amount of rot in the center, which prevented me from easily gaining a good hold with the screw chuck.  The piece was heavily cracked and as a burl it was likely to not be totally solid in the best of circumstances.  I realize that at this point some turners, some of whom have written articles to this effect, would have tossed this burl blank away in favor of something smooth, easy and predictable, but I thought I could salvage this piece.  I practically soaked it in cyanoacrylate by generously filling every crack and gap that I could see.  I left it to cure for several days before returning to try again.

Trying Again With More Success

On a second try, I was able to screw chuck mount the piece and start the turning process by shaping the outside a small amount but mostly leaving it the dimensions it was originally cut to, and cutting an interior tenon on the bottom to use with the Nova G3 chuck in expansion mode.  The wood held together reasonably well but some small pieces did fly off.  When turning wood of this type, a slower turning speed and higher levels of patience are essential!

I first drilled out the interior of the blank before attempting to use any lathe tools by mounting the Forstner drill into the tail of the lathe in a drill chuck.  Manzanita wood is quite dense and hard so the going was slow, plus it pays to be cautious when working with any burl wood since there is no advance way to tell just what all might be hidden inside.  I have heard tales of dirt and even stones being incorporated into root burls such as this one but I was fortunate to encounter nothing worse than some dirt pockets.

By working slowly with Robert Sorby bowl gouges and round nosed scrapers, I was able to reach a depth and shape that I was pleased with but the bowl is certainly unconventional.  The natural edge includes a significant missing piece that extends at least halfway down the depth of the bowl and there is another gap just up from the bottom edge.  There are numerous cracks and gaps in both the interior and the exterior of the bowl, bearing testimony to the great lengths necessary to keep the piece from flying apart while turning it!  But at the end, I was enormously pleased with the natural artistry of the piece that evolved as the piece was created based on what the wood “wanted” to do.  I have a particular fondness for pieces that highlight the unique character of the wood used, even when, or perhaps especially, when the wood presents a challenge during the turning process.  I also greatly admire the natural reddish tone of the Manzanita and am especially pleased with the wild figure and grain pattern of the burl wood which moves and swirls in literally every possible direction.

Final Thoughts and Considerations

I understand that working with a piece of material this potentially challenging, and I suppose perhaps dangerous if a piece were to fly off the lathe, is not something that everyone would choose to undertake.  However, I always use appropriate protective equipment such as a face shields or other eye protection, and I don’t encourage bystanders and spectators during the turning process.  For me, the results that can be achieved with a less than perfect blank are worth the extra time, care, and potential for mishaps that are inherent in the process.

The Manzanita bowl process, with its bits and pieces unexpectedly flying everywhere and the need to employ significant amounts of cyanoacrylate to hold it together presents an interesting and markedly different experience from the process of making the Raywood Ash bowl.  But the possibility of such differences, never knowing exactly what one is getting into, or what one will end up with in the end, is an inherent part of the attraction of turning for me.  I enjoy the endless adventure provided by each unique individual piece of wood I turn whether it was the mostly friendly Raywood Ash or the more challenging but still beautiful Manzanita.