Go big or go home

Today I started on what will ultimately be almost a year long project. I roughed out the largest bowl that I have ever done, and just about the largest bowl my lathe will handle. The blank measured just under 20" in diameter x 8" deep. the roughed out bowl is about 18" in diameter. It will ultimately be dried, re-turned, and I wm planning on embelleshing the outer surface with a flame motif of analine dyes and wood burning. It is going to be a gift for a good friend who is retiring from the fire department next May.

I was also able to core out the center and save a few bowl blanks from it. This not only saves time by not having to rough out the whole bowl, but it gets much more yield from the blank. This blank ultimately will get me 4 finished bowls. I would have had a 5th bowl just a little smaller than the biggest blank, but I don't have the large size coring tools and had to improvise a little bit. This resulted in losing the larger bowl. I'll still take what I can get. I'm happy getting the 3 smaller bowls out of the piece.