Anniversary Ash Flower Vase

Yesterday was the anniversary of 38 years of marriage to my wonderful and beautiful wife (Elizabeth), friend, grandmother to my grandchildren and mother to my children. Since I started woodturning I’ve done some sort of special project for special occaisions, at first bowls but eventually got down to usually a vase or some sort, I almost always usually finish it the night before …collect some flowers or green things 🙂 and put it on the table with a card. Neighbors must think I’m some kind of whacko ….since I am foraging plants to put in these vases at 2am or latter. When things are alive we have plenty to choose from. Winter, early spring and late fall provide little to chose from so they usually are dry flowers. I always try to throw a couple of cockleburs, thorns and other weeds to remind us that life hasn’t been easy. I will usually explain what the cocklebur represents or the ragweed ….sometimes an acorn or two. I suppose most women would have tossed me and the vases a long time ago ….but not mine….she is a keeper 🙂

Had An Ash Vase in the Works

My father in law had gotten very sick in the last 2 weeks….they did not know if he was going to make it, however he spent a week in the hospital and then was released to a convalescent facility where they would determine where he would go depending on his improvement. I guess I never had the perfect relationship with my wife’s family but I felt sorry for the old guy. He loves gardening, flowers and vodka. I came up with the idea of making a big enough vase that I could put some flowers in it and have a trap door on the bottom where I could hide a couple 1 ounce bottles of vodka. So I secretly started working on “Operation Nursing Home”  The guy is 92, has had a drink evey night after dinner for the last 20 or 30 years and now has been cut off…..I felt sorry for him. So, I had been working on this project for about 2 or 3 weeks. He had lost almost all his strenght and balance but still had presence of mind to be determined to make a come back, so I wanted it to be as easy as possible for him to get to the goods to take the edge off his situation ….when I told my wife, I do not think she approved …..but I pushed on 🙂

Well, I had some Trojan Vase design flaws. It had to be big enough to be a Trojan horse …holding the flowers and the vodka. He was weak, probably not as coordinated as he once was and I didn’t know if he would be able to remove the flowers to get to the trap door? I know, some of you will think I am terrible for doing this. But remember, he has lived his life, no medicines were changed and they had a “happy hour” on Friday’s where they could have a beer or wine. So I thought I was helping …..after all, he went in there cold turkey from the hospital, no alcohol for a week and he had to be going through withdrawls and since no one in my wife’s  family likes me anyway I wanted to help eliminate some pain and discomfort…..I had nothing to lose!

Never Finished the Nursing Home Project

Turned out I had hollowing problems while woodturning the vase. I also had one back surgery/procedure per week which affected me much more than I thought. I had 4 of these procedures so far and although it is amazing what can be done and my doctor/surgeon is the best it started to really affect me. Constant pain, constant sickness and I could barely move. So my good intentions still have not made it to my poor father-in-law.

Repurposed the Custom
Woodturned Nursing Home Vase

So, I found myself with one of the best shaped vases I have made in a long time. I just needed to figure out how to hollow the rock hard ash  end grain out so I could get the size I needed.

Had to Make a Quick Decision For
The Purpose of The Trojan Horse Vase

Sometimes things just work out. That night I was hurting from the surgery but had a half finished vase. I really wanted to give my wife something for putting up with me all these years so I repurposed the nursing home vase to an anniversary vase!

How Can I Become More Efficient
At Hollowing Endgrain

That’s the story. However it has put me on the hunt on how to become more efficient on hollowing. If I had $500 or more I would buy one of those hollowing systems …..I don’t have the cash so I need to figure out how to make something that can help me hollow. I would really like to do hollow forms without spending an arm and a leg. Furthermore, I would like to be able to hollow out a simple log end grain without having to spend all kinds of money and install some sort of expensive system. A quick check on Amazon reveals some of the most used hollowing systems or you can check Youtube for Hollowing Systems 

Guess I will be spending my next weeks and months doing some research on how to build a hollowing system myself.

Unless some of you who manufacture hollowing systems would like to send me your system so I can test it and do a review? I see this happening all the time, yet no one has approached me to test their products for a true and factual review.

Back to My End Grain Hollowing Problems On My Vase Woodturning Projects

I had been working on an ash vase for the last week, I had a terrible time hollowing it. The end grain was so hard my tools were taking forever to make any progress, in fact I think I took the temper off a forstner bit because it got so hot ….couldn’t even make it all the way down.

I have a ton of dead ash so I’d like to get a good system for working with with it, especially end-grain hollowing. Turning the outside was a piece of cake, cuts well….little tear out. I finished it with a couple of coats of Deft Lacquer Sanding Sealer and sprayed a few coats of Satin Lacquer from Watco.

Hollowing An Ash Vase While Woodturning

First off, I am doing end grain hollowing. Secondly I knew this was gonna be tough because it was a big piece and I needed an average of 4″ diameter for the hollowing.

I figured I would start with a 1″ forstner bit, then 2″ bit and then a 2-1/2″ bit. I sharpened all bits and started. It was slow going with the one inch bit but I got about 10″ down into the vase. I put the next big on and only could get down to about 5 or 6 inches so I then tried the 2 1/2″ bit and got no where with it, maybe 2 inches before it got so hot I think it lost its temper.

So next I tried some gouges, I first tried the spindle gouge hollowing method. I just couldn’t do it. I tried a couple different size bowl gouges and it was catch city.

Carbide Cutter Tools for Hollowing End Grain Woodturning Projects

I turned to my trusty round carbide cutter tool. I think the cutter is 15mm and I could make that work but it was slow going. I just made another round carbide tool

with a 10mm cutter on it but the steel it was mounted to was only 3/8 or an inch and there was just too much flutter.

Using Big Hurricane
Scrapers For Hollowing

Next I tried my big Hurricane scrapers  and surprisingly they did very well. I couldn’t get a very good angle for shear cutting with them so I had to just scrape. These are big scrapers 3/8″ to 1/2″ thick and 1 1/2″ wide.

I had my custom built steady rest on the piece at all times ….otherwise I am sure it would have gone air born more than once, if that thing hit me in the head (even though I had my shield on) I probably would have gone down!

Anyway, I finished it with the scrapers and my homemade carbide tools. I could not hollow as far and wide as I wanted to so I need to find a solution, an inexpensive solution to the problem. Hopefully something I can make.

Making the Platic Insert for
The Wood Turned Vase

I was going to use a water bottle as the insert and I did. However, I had to turn the water bottle upside down and cut the bottom out because the vase hole was kind of tapered. In order to make that work I used some CA on the bottle cap and glued and sealed that into place.

Facebook Group, Wood Turning Basics for
Hollowing Ideas for Woodturners

I asked my facebook group, Wood Turning Basics what was working for others. Here is the copy of my post:

Best Hollowing Tools
For Endgrain Hollowing

Well, 8/28 is my wife and my anniversary….. 38 years, who would have thought 🙂

Seems like yesterday, time just flies by so fast ….good times, bad times …its all time and it seems the older you get the faster the days go by. My father told me that when he was alive and I really could not relate ….but his words were so true.

My wife and I raised 3 boys, all of which we are extremely pround of. We have 2 grandsons that are my reason for living ….don’t know what I would do without them. And we have one in the oven!

Anyway, I was working on an ash vase ….had problems, lathe broke, couldn’t hollow it correctly…..but I always try to make something for these special days. So, I hollowed the best I could…. it was designed to hold a plastic water bottle insert. Since the hollowing was tapered at the end I glued the cap on and cut the bottom off to fit inside the vase. It turned out pretty good, no leaks and almost got the whole water bottle inside the vase.

Since I was still working on it, I left the tenon on it and turned a piece of oak for the base. The oak platform has a recess that accepts the tenon from the vase and I hot glued them together. I was thinking that at some point in time I might finish it correctly and knock the base off, finsh hollowing and remove the tenon ….but if I know myself that propbably will never happen 🙂

I finished around 4am and then went out to look for some flowers to put in the vase. I found some geraniums, flocks, ferns, hostas, wild grape vines, some type yew I think, horseradish leaf and a few other miscellaneous plants.

We live a pretty simple life. Liz really enjoys what I put together. I’m blessed and lucky to have been married to her for all these years!

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