Is there anywere to get bowl blanks for making ladels ?

I get a disk, a dishing form and a hammer or use my press for thick stuff like 1/4" to 1/2" steel

king metals dot com

We use caps for pipe fence (oilfeild and schedual 40)

You want a positive or a negative tool?

 

Get a piece of end grain wood and make a depression with an angle grinder.  Use the bottom of a Oxygen cylinder that had been cut off. Lots of ways, just choose what works for you. 

Charles, using pipe caps is pretty dang brilliant!  I would never have thought of that.

 

The one thing I hate about making ladles and bowls is having to cut out the blank to start with.  Pipe caps solve that problem very nicely.

and for people not familiar with them; these are not the plumbing pipe caps that screw on the end of pipe but disks that are sold to be welded to the ends of pipes to cap them off.  Sometimes they come slightly dished to start with..so more often found at places that sell steel for welding than at plumbing supply places in my experience.

I don't make ladles, but I do make spoons and I have a friendly fabricator cut blanks out of 6mm sheet with his cnc plasma cutter :)  I expect if I were to make ladles he would be able to do me a run of blanks with the handles or a stub that would start the handle pretty reasonably and aside from the forging needed I would have whatever shape I actually want 

I had a friend have a run done of blanks for making cowboy hats from; then he found he could buy the pipe caps for *much* *less* and they were in stock and came in a wide range of sizes...

I tend to grab any disks I find at the scrapyard as they always get used for something!

More often than not ladels and spoons were forged from one peice of material.  The rivited on bowl is less common to see in old work though it was done.   I myself really enjoy peening out the bowl from thicker stock.  It gives me a sence of acomplishment but I don't make spoons for sale I tend to give them as gifts.

I have a friend cut my round blanks out on his CNC plasma table.

 

I used to cut them out by hand with tin snips, but as the required quantities went up it wasn't worth the wear & tear on my body to continue cutting them by hand, plus the time it took to manually cut them wasn't in line with my goals.

Got a block of wood and cut a dish into, it no wondering do i anel the metal before beating it to shape or shape it hot

Mister miller, i think their was a lot more forgewelding in old work. Time is money, and welding a small gage handle on was faster than drawing down a peice of stock big enugh to draw a ladle bowl from, same trick as reighns on tongs.

got my ladel done thanks to yall

Very nice work, Juke.

I'm well aware time is money.  But not everything I forge is about making a buck.  You need to push yourself or your going to get stuck in a rut.  

you could get a swage block that had the size and shape you want for spoons, ladles, etc.  But they be pricey

The saltfork craftsman swage block isnt all to pricy and it has a ladle and serving spoon swage

Charles, just had a quick peek at Salt Forks site. Definitely informative and makes me wish I didn't live so far away! 8 hour drive to make it to the northwest meetings is just a bit out of my range.

They will sell to non members, and I belive ship, obviusly members, picking it up their selves don't pay shipping and handling.

All of the ladle bowls I formed and my students did was done on a block of 4"x4" end grain oak.  Cheap and easy to make and get.  We used the head of a RR spike red hot to rough form the bowl by burning.  A bit a carving with a gouge, then rough sanding, and we were ready to go.  Took less than a class period to prepare.  For copper work, they lasted a long time.  For hot steel work, they did burn, but were easy to reshape, or cut off the end and remake it, or just use the other end.  We never used an iron swage block.  The oak worked great.  When they were too far gone, I took them home and threw them in my wood stove.