Hollowing

     Hollowing, in the woodturning world is how one removes the material from the inside of urns, vases, closed forms, etc.  Because of the depth or sharp angles of these types of items, a normal gouge or scraper, should not be attempted for safety reasons, if nothing else.  There are several different hollowing systems available today.  The first one that I purchased was the arm brace set up, and I still use it quite a bit today.  It works well for closed forms and items that are not real deep.  I soon wanted to make urns and vases that were sixteen or eighteen inches in depth, so the thing that I needed was a deep hollowing system. I think that I used the system the way that it came for two or three times before I started to modify it. 

     After I was happy with the tool itself, I soon realized that other than by sound and using my hand, if it fit inside, there was no way to check the wall thickness when over fourteen inches deep.  I had seen a picture of an adjustable arm with a laser light that clamped on the bar itself, so after a few modifications and a trip to a local office supply store, I made my own laser light measuring system.  This system works by setting the wall thickness measurement you would like between the light beam and the cutter.  When the light beam is at the outside of the item, the wall thickness is at whatever you set it for.  The biggest draw back to this, the second system was that the cutter is mounted on an arm, which is fixed in the straight out position.  Even after making some attachments of my own, which allowed me to use other system’s cutters, I was still limited by the size hole that I was working through as to how sharp of an angle and the diameter the item could be. 

     So still not being able to do the things that I wanted to, I am now on system number three.  This system comes with four interchangeable cutter arms from straight to what is called a double bend.  There is also an adapter available which allows you to use the arms and cutters from other brand’s systems.  It also comes with its own adjustable laser light arm.  The arm can easily be installed or removed as needed.  I have only modified one part of the system so far and I have been using it for about a year now. “Hey, for me to change only one thing is almost unheard of”.