Stackable Wood Bowls
One of my favorite hobbies (not including MicroPs) is woodworking. It offers a pretty cool release outside of regular academic responsibilities. This week I spent some extra time in the woodshop, working on the wood lathe on my most recent project: stackable bowls.
This set of four bowls started as a 3x3x6” rectangular block of canary wood. The first step, before mounting on the lathe is to get the wood as cylindrical as possible, which saves a lot of time and frustration when it is time to shape it on the lathe.
After I sanded down the corners, and accidentally snapped the belt on the belt sander (don’t worry, I replaced it), it was time to mount my wood on the lathe. Since I didn’t want to drill into the wood, I opted to mount my wood between two live centers.
After I had my wood shaped into a cylinder, it was time to cut the wood into four smaller cylinders. For this, I opted to use the lathe parting tool, which I had never used before. I made sure that the corner of the tool wouldn’t catch, and was fairly successfull. I opted to finish the cuts with the japanese saw, which allowed me to get a flush cut.
Next, I moved to carving the foot of each bowl. To do this, I mounted each cylinder onto the adjustable self centering lathe chuck and shaped a foot for each bowl. To allow each bowl to stack, I inset each foot. To account for future wood warping, I carved out the feet.
The feet also offered a mounting point for the adjustable lathe chuck to grab as I carved the inside of each bowl. When carving the inside of each bowl, I practiced with different tool angle and placements. It was a fun practice, and resulted in bowls with interior right angles and a bowl with a ring holder.
One of my favorite things about woodworking is that the measurements are all a vibe. As long as the bowls were roughly the same height, thickness, and depth I would be happy. As I shaped the bowls, I made sure that everything would be flush when stacked.
After all the bowls were shaped, it was time to sand. It was enjoyable to sand as I could just run the lathe.
Finally, it was time to polish the pieces. I opted to use a Beeswax & Orange oil based wood conditioner. I applied the conditioner and allowed it to soak overnight before wiping off the excess.
Ultimately I am happy with how it turned out. Since all the bowls came from the same piece of wood, it can be stacked with the grain continuing through the bowls.


