Turning An Eccentric Or Off Axis Wood Goblet
In this video, I try my hand again to turn an eccentric goblet. I’ll turn the eccentric stem separately from the cup and the base just to keep things a little easier.
The stem is 2×2″ maple about 6″ long. I started turning with the axis running almost corner to corner. Then as I finished a bead, I changed the axis. The result is a little guess and by gosh but I tried to keep the main stem somewhat in line as it comes up thru the beads. I sanded each groove as I completed it as I’m sure I could never reposition the wood back into that same position. I used a long strip of sand paper to keep my hands out of harms way.
But after several beads, the eccentric ghosts came to haunt my goblet. The stem failed and I lost what would have been the top third of the stem.
Now it became a salvage operation. I finished off the stem, then turned a cup and a small base from walnut. The hard part now was to carefully trim back the rough area from where the stem broke.
The goblet is finished with shellac friction polish.
This goblet does not have the dramatic sweep I intended – it’s kind of short and plump. But, I’ll be trying this one again. I cannot let the eccentric ghosts get the better of me!
Alan,
I’ve been subscribing to your blog and videos for about a month, and I love it. Thank you! I did some turning in high school and the. My early- mid 20’s, then took my woodworking in other directions. Now, 30 + years later I am being drawn back to turning. I’ve recently purchased a new lathe and am enjoying feeling my way back into it. Your postings are a great tutorial, and while I don’t necessarily want to explore each project, at least for now (I.e. eccentric turnings), I never fail to learn something from you each time I view your videos. I don’t yet have a four jaw chuck but am preparing to buy one, as bowl turning particularly interests me. Any advice on what to look for? Has this possibly been covered in a past posting that I have not found yet? Thanks again for you efforts!
I highly recommend a chuck. See “Woodturning An Easter Bowl Without A 4-Jaw Chuck” where I reverted to doing a bowl without one. After turning one again without a chuck I recommend one even more strongly.
It seems that everyone recommends the first chuck they’ve bought unless they’ve had a bad experience. I use a Vicmark VM120 and I do like it. If I did not have one already I would check out one by Easy Wood Tools. It has some nice features but I have no experience with it one way or another. For my smaller lathe I have an Apprentice chuck. It’s ok but not as robust as the VM120 but the VM120 would be much to big for a mini lathe.
I appreciate the VM120 using a standard Allen wrench for tightening.
I like standard dovetail jaws and don’t like the ones that have a series of grips inside the jaws.
I use several sets of jaws: standard dovetail; long nose; a set as wide as the chuck base; and a deep set;
I hope this helps.
Alan Stratton
Thank you for the response Alan. I’ll look into the Vicmark and Easy Wood Tools. In the mean time, I’ll keep watching!