today we have cork oak this comes to us from my good friend Dennis and boy I'm telling you I am resisting the urge attempting to resist the urge to turn it just as you see it it's it's almost a perfect square I did just come from the band saw trimming up the ends a little bit and I didn't intentionally make it that way but it's about 8 in square just about perfect within about a 16th of an inch and I don't know why that causes me to think I should leave it square but I'm trying as as hard as I can not to good morning good afternoon good evening as we like to stay here at Shady Acres wood shop howdy let's take a closer look at it Dennis had the ends all sealed up with uh whatever wax or something to keep it from splitting and he did a pretty good job it did split here well he did a good job I mean you can't sometimes you just can't stop it so that split this biggest split here goes to about here and then I can't see that it goes any further than that and down here it goes a little ways well it comes in here but I don't think it's comes up very high I don't think it'll be an issue so I'm I'm not going to worry about it I know last week I turned a piece that had Square ends on it and the sides were turned but not much so from the top looking down at it it looked like it was Square as well all the way around I'll have to flatten off the bottom of course and put a Tenon or a recess or something in there but just there's just something that appeals to me about having a round Bowl in the middle of a square block of wood now if you're not familiar with cork oak that is Cork and I've turned a few of these pieces so if you're a regular viewer you may have seen me turn it before but that's cork like a cork board like a wine cork that's Cork and that's where it comes from it's an oak tree called cork oak and and it's one of my favorite Woods to turn because it it just looks so unusual the piece is 8 by 8 3 and 1/2 in thick on that end 4 and half inches thick on the other end so I don't know I'm I'm I'm I'm inclined to leave it Square I I don't know what I'll do but what I am going to do is measure and find the center of this take it to the drill press drill a large flat spot for my Chuck Jaws are set against in the middle of that I'm going to drill a hole for my woodworm screw we'll get this mounted up on the lathe and do something with it [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] here's what I've drilled and now we're ready to mount [Music] it yeah it's not going to work I drill that out to 3 and 1/2 in but because the bark is so thick especially on this high side here I'll show you the the Chuck body is hitting right here so I'm just I think it's well maybe it's hitting over here too here and here so I'm going to take this over here to the workbench take a chisel to that cut that away a little bit and then I'll get it mounted up okay you can see I just chipped away some of the high spots I think we'll make it now yep all righty Dy before we get going here I wanted to read you a letter that I got hi Phil thanks for all the inspiration I've gotten from your show I've watched all your videos and really enjoy your work it is easy to understand what you are doing with each piece I am sending a piece of my work to show my appreciation sincerely Bill Brown first of all that's just really nice I just love getting a letter like that but of course accompanying the letter was Bill's piece of work which put a big smile on my face just a big smile to me I don't know I don't know how this came about but to me this looks like it was a cut off from a a longer nicer board and this got tossed maybe in the fire and Bill said wait whoa wait a minute get that back here I can make something out of that and he did and it's a beauty it's a piece of cherry all he did was turn a a simple Bowl in the middle there he did put a decorative ring around it which is really cool and then he added a couple of metal buttons he does metal work as well as uh wood turning but this just goes to show you that you don't need some big expensive piece of wood to make something really nice and this is really nice I really love this I I so appreciate it beautiful finish nice and smooth feels great slippery I really really really like it bill sent this from his home in Evon Illinois really cool Bill thank you so much I'm still arguing with myself about leave it square or round it up I did put CA in this crack right here I did not put it in the one that's up here that's much much larger I I still might do that I don't know but what I'm going to do is flatten off the bottom I know I know I need to do that we're going to be turning at 700 RPM 5/8 in B gouge fresh they sharpened mask and face shield on [Applause] [Music] oh okay that's pretty flat I guess we'll lay out for a Tannon or a recess I don't know which I think uh I think a recess and for that I'll use a/2 in gou now I'm going to use my Dove Tail tool to put a dove tail on the side here that's good now I made that deeper than I need to so I can move some of the wood over here and make a some sort of little base for it to set [Music] on so now the Moment of Truth square has it is or round it up PE up I can't hear you square who said square if I don't do it it's more work for me it's really easy one of the benefits of uh being a wood turner and sanding when it comes to sanding is it's really easy cuz it just spins past you the work spins past you all you got to do is hold your sandpaper out there when you're doing flat work you're moving all over the dang Place nobody likes that but in this case if I leave it square I have to St on the bottom then I have to S on this side then I have to St on this side then this side then this side it's it's it's a lot more work if I don't round it up but I'm not afraid of work I guess well now that I'm looking at this I I made the base too small this is the size I'd make if I was making a round Bowl I guess I decided to go Square so I need to make my base come out here a little little bigger it just looks funny this way so I'm going to move it out I don't know somewhere around here [Music] [Music] [Music] yep far superior and I don't know maybe you're thinking so what it's the bottom who cares but because it's Square it can sit on any of these four four edges I think at least two of them for sure you might want to display this side if that looks good to you I know you're still trying to get over being Square well you'll get over it you'll see it's going to look real nice so what does that mean means time for sanding I'm going to start the sanding with my sandal Flex I'm going to sand all of the bark on these two edges and then along the top where I can reach we'll be turning away a bowl portion up there so I don't have to do all of it but I'll do along the edges when I'm done with that I'll switch to my 2in disc starting at 80 grit working up through 400 I'll have the LA spinning and verse at about 350 RPM and I'll show you what that looks like soon as I get my mask on I'll be doing a lot more of that and then I haven't quite decided what I'm going to do on the flat Parts I might do this or I might get out of belt sander or I might get out of finish sander I don't know what I'm going to do but I'll do something and I'll bring you back here in a bit we're going to put sanding sealer on there I know that for a fact I'll tell you why in a bit well sanding just wasn't too bad at all and I'm very pleased about that it took longer but it wasn't hard probably took a couple hours but I've certainly spent a whole lot more time than that sanding this is an interesting piece of uh cork oak as was the last piece the first two three pieces that I turned of this was a much lighter o colored Oak and this one is darker and so was the last one so I don't know if they came from different places or just why that is I don't know maybe Dennis will chime in here and tell us and this is sanding sealer I'm applying and I said I'd tell you why the why is because I think on the first few pieces I turned of this certainly on the last one but I'm I'm sure on probably all of them I said okay on the next one I'll use sanding ceing because on those I used feeding wax and my thinking for using the feeding wax was because I thought it would keep the the cork Supple I was afraid a a harder finish like shellac which is not a hard finish it's not like poly or anything like that so I said I would do it and I'm doing it shellac based sanding sealer I'll put on a couple of coats of this and a couple of coats of shellac and we'll just see what happens sure is pretty wood though as the light catching all of that there's some chatoyant in there now and then lots of nice figure I did the ends the same way I did well not the same way but with my 2in Disc Sander I didn't use anything else on the ends and I did fill this larger crack up here along with the skinny little crack I filled the larger one and I actually used wood chips in there wood chips and CA and now I know you probably can't see it it's a slightly darker color but it was just a I don't usually F cracks like that but that one was pretty big I didn't necessarily do it for strength I did it more for appearance I guess and now I'm going to use a brush on all the bark I never know if I should call it bark or if I should call it cork same thing I am real curious if it feels hard once it's all dry and we're done with it with the feeding wax it still felt soft you could dig your finger into it or your fingernail at least and I'm just going over an inch or so I'm not doing the whole top because we're going to be turning a lot of that away this is what I'll be doing for a bit like I said two coats of this two coats of shellac I'll bring it back and we'll start working on the inside see you in a bit I got a beautiful finish on the bottom and the sides here the way the Finish affected the cork was it's much smoother of course this is sanded up here this is sanded with my sandal flex but it's you know it's different this is flat smooth this just about feels like wood here where it's only been sanded with the sandal Flex it's not flatten smooth it still seems to have a little bit of give to it maybe not quite as much as with no finish at all but still still feels like it can push on it we're going to be turning at 777 RPM 5/8 in bouds mask and face shield on I just want to see where we are in regards to the side here and that's just about further than I wanted to go it's it's okay that's probably about right I want to leave a goodly amount of it you know it's cor kind of unusual we don't want to turn it all away sure we have a goodly amount to go but because it's not a typical Bowl shape doesn't taper in it's kind of hard to tell oh yeah we got a long way to go and I see there's going to be plenty of bark left [Music] I'm going to come clear back up here and go straighter [Music] down it's just so disconcerting not being a t paper I just feel like I'm getting near the bottom but when I measure I'm not still got an inch yeah okay I'm I'm liking that better anyway got a knot in there that doesn't show on the bottom [Music] I'm going to go sharpen up I'm still not happy with the thickness how much how much bark I have here if you're not a wood turner this might be difficult for me to explain what I need to do is this is thinner right here than it is right there thicker here than it is here and that's because I'm curving the bowl in and by the time it gets down this far I've already started my curve in so what I need to do is start way back up here and go straight down to catch this and and thin that down about the best I can do is maybe gain a/4 of an inch which uh in full diameter that's a/ an inch qu inch on each side qu inch all the way around the problem is I I do still have about an inch in the bottom I I need to have enough to make that curve down there blend the curve if I just go straight down we're going to end up with a flat bottom bowl and there's nothing worse than looking at one of those I'm going to do it and I'm just going to hope that I still have enough thickness down here to make that corner and blend it all in and I'm still not going to gain that much I I feel like I I need to do that so that's what I'm going to do [Music] now see I didn't change the thickness of this any up here at the top but I changed it all the way down I I can tell it's better you probably can't from where you are but it is better and I think I gained probably 38 of an inch but now I got to work on making that corner [Applause] well we're down about about a half an inch now yeah see that's starting to w wiggle a little bit I don't want to I don't want to break that off so that's about as thin as I can go up here okay that's as thin as I'm going down there so little scrape [Music] oh nice Corner nice corner I see I need to come up here a little bit higher okay nice time for sanding I'm starting at 80 grit and working up through 400 just like I did on the outside I'll bring you back here in a bit and we'll put some sanding sealer on there see in a bit I think this piece is growing on me pretty unusual not that it's growing on me but unusual shape and this crack right here is the crack that I filled from the outside and it's mostly filled on the inside here as well so it did go all the way through and that's a good [Music] thing I came up of the title for this round cork hole in a square Oak Bowl yep that pretty well describes it see you in a bit be sure you stick around at the end of the video so you can see the before and after shots of this piece if you'd share the video I'd really appreciate that thank you so much well here it is one Cork Oak Square Bowl in the books squares can be that ought to get somebody's OCD going I suppose not my intention not trying to drive anybody crazy it's just how it happened and I went with it and I I got to tell you I really like it I just really like it well what's not to like look at look at the bark the cork it's wonderful it's just wonderful and it's smooth beautiful figure color in there it'll stand up on all four sides so you can stand it any which way you want to just like that just like that there's just so much to see and feel here feel is probably as important as anything so many different textures bark inclusions the bark the wood itself open grain Oak you can feel the grain through my finish I love that yet the Finish is quite good I'd say this is kind of cool where a branch started coming out here got that smile on the end there oh that's where I filled it I filled this crack right here and I filled it with the the wood I turned last week which was Plum so that's Plum color which might not seem like it it may not be coming through in the camera being purplish might not seem like the right thing but if you look carefully at some of the bark there's some kind of reddish brownish purplish color in the bark as well so for me it works love that bark inclusion there I really hope you like it let me know what you think thank you Dennis for bringing this along for all to enjoy if you like this video thumbs up please I'd sure appreciate it if you're a subscriber thank you so much I truly appreciate that if you're not a subscriber you might consider becoming one I put out regular videos about one a week and I'd like to keep in touch I so much appreciate you taking your time to spend with me today it means a lot to me so for now this is Phil Shady Acres wood shop signing off for