I've been on something of a kick lately and have been hammering out some dishes.  Half the fun is playing with the temper colors to see what kinds of patterns I can come up with.

My biggest, to date, is just over 9" across and about 2" deep.  

 

 

nice work.. Love to see a different take on things.. Love the colors. 

Texture and colours are great. How have you sealed it?

Great bowl, and it is fun to ply with temp colors.  Love the hook ruler also!!

Thank you, gentlemen.

Aus, I'm currently using Minwax paste floor wax in lieu of the more traditional Johnson's PFW.  And I think I might like it better in terms of how nicely it goes on and what it looks like once cooled down.

How was it done? What did you start with?

Very nice Vaughn. The pattern you got inside versus outside makes me think that you hammered from the outside onto something with that pattern on the inside? 

 

On October 3, 2016 at 4:14 PM, zadvorney said:

How was it done? What did you start with?

You start with a circular piece of steel and hammer until it starts to cup.  Then you following that cupping to get the curve you want.  It pays big dividends to start with a weld-on pipe end cap that's already got some curve to it, but you can easily do it with flat sheet if that's all you have.

On October 3, 2016 at 4:19 PM, Daswulf said:

Very nice Vaughn. The pattern you got inside versus outside makes me think that you hammered from the outside onto something with that pattern on the inside? 

 

Nope.  You've got it backwards.  The hammer marks on the inside are caused by the hammer and what you see on the outside is from the anvil.  Hammering from the inside gives the dish "visible" ambiance that customers like.  That's the part they see and feel all the time, so that's the dressy side.  I use a selection of ball-peen hammers to create different divots depending on the size of the bowl and where on it I'm working.  

It requires lots and lots of hammering, but that hammering hardens the steel as well as giving it a pleasant texture.  The result is a dish that rings beautifully when struck.

Think my eyes were deceiving me since the divots Looked like raised bumps until I looked again and saw divots in the bottom part of the bowl in the first picture. 

Your hammered effect is very neat and uniform and looks excellent. 

Thank you.

Works on square dishes, too.

6"x6"x.125"

The corners come up about 1.5" -- depending on how I'm feeling at the time.

 

 

Nice work!!!!

Vaughn, two questions:

Are you working these bowls cold? or hot?

Do you dish them on a stump or does the curve come naturally from hammering on the anvil?

Thanks a lot,

Anthony

23 hours ago, tonyw said:

Are you working these bowls cold? or hot?

Do you dish them on a stump or does the curve come naturally from hammering on the anvil?

Thanks a lot,

Anthony

Tony -- Cold, cold, cold.

The only time you should get the metal hot is when you first start out and want to set the hardness in the steel so the bowl will ring properly.  Heat the blank to a nice orange and then quench it in water.  While it's mild steel, it does have carbon in it and will harden a itty bitty bit.  All the hammering you do after that, giving it the nice texture, will further work-harden the steel making it as resonant as it can possibly be.

A lot of the curve will happen naturally as you hammer the inside of the dish.  You can magnify this by holding the steel up off the anvil at an angle and hitting down into the void rather than hitting square on the piece that's supported by the anvil.

Start in the middle and slowly circle outwards with your ballpeen.  Try different radii on the peen end to get different sizes of divots in the steel.  I prefer a squished ball rather than perfectly round, but sometimes you need round or even pointed a little bit to get into a tight curve.  Everything's really up to you and what you're trying to achieve.

A stump will certainly help and I'm a huge fan of my Dad's invention -- the Steel Puck of Awesomeness.  While we're still fighting on the name, it's been a real boon to my dish-making endeavors.  I like it far better than a wood stump because it doesn't smoke like a demon when working hot steel in it and I don't have to worry about it being in the way or checking at an inopportune place.

I throw the SPoA on my anvil, and it stays put even without a hardy stem.  I have cold-worked bowls that were .125" thick without any problems.

Two brand new SPoA fresh off the lathe:

SPoA rather scratched after working her first dish to shape.  She's a workhorse and I wonder how many bowls I'll need to make before she wears out!

Thanks for answering my questions, Vaughn.

On December 11, 2016 at 11:08 PM, tonyw said:

Thanks for answering my questions, Vaughn.

Glad to help.

Here's three more I finished last night.  They're small 5.25" versions, but perfectly sized for keys, candles and general clutter-catching!

 

Those bowls look nice. I used your idea of dishing square plate for a candleholder. I tweaked the design a bit and made a set of five candleholders which sold for $60 at our youth charity auction, which I thought wasn't doing too badly for a first attempt. I was unable to get pictures taken before the candleholders were sold, unfortunately.

18 hours ago, tonyw said:

Those bowls look nice. I used your idea of dishing square plate for a candleholder. I tweaked the design a bit and made a set of five candleholders which sold for $60 at our youth charity auction, which I thought wasn't doing too badly for a first attempt. I was unable to get pictures taken before the candleholders were sold, unfortunately.

Congrats on the sale, Tony!  How'd you tweak the design?  Bend the corners back on down?

Actually I used a cross-pein on the corners of the square and drew all four corners out, so the resulting shape was a bit more like a star rather than a diamond. I made four little ones like that and then I made a bigger one the same way except that I cut the blank for the bowl so that there was material to draw out and make a handle for your fingers to go through. Of course after I drew out the corners then I dimpled and dished the bowls. If you have trouble visualizing the design tweak I can ask the person who bought the candle-holders to take a picture.

Or you could just make some more and take pictures of them......

Sounds like you came up with something neat!

Here. They are a bit cruder than your perfectly dished bowls, but hey... I hope to make more of these sets. Hopefully I can make them a bit more refined, as I make more of them...

Edited December 21, 20169 yr by tonyw

Nice, idea for future...the ladies love to burn candles=good gifts

2 hours ago, tonyw said:

I hope to make more of these sets. Hopefully I can make them a bit more refined, as I make more of them...

 

Very nice work!  I like the organic shaping, and drawing out the corners was a really brilliant idea.  I actually have a blank that I drew the corners out on but didn't like how it turned out.  That blasted thing has been sitting on my bench for as long as I can remember - just laughing at me.  Now I have an idea on how to reform it into something respectable!

 

On December 20, 2016 at 5:58 PM, tonyw said:

Actually I used a cross-pein on the corners of the square and drew all four corners out.....

Thanks for thinking outside the box, Tony!  I took your idea of drawing out the "dog ears" and was able to salvage a couple of pieces that have been sitting on my bench for ages!

The dish part is just a 3"x3" square with the corners drawn out super thin (too thin, actually).  The edges were a wee bit sharp, so I curled them down to create a more organic flow and, hopefully, prevent any cuts when folks are handling the thing.

The middle is just a 1" mild steel ball that I squished flat and drilled through.  I was planning on just riveting the dish to the base, but it didn't look very good, so I had to make the stand-off.

 

 

Hey Guys,

Let me join to the dishing fun!  I really like what you do and read/looked it with much amusement!

On the other hand I like it hot  So these babies here are made of a bit thicker plate (5mm stainless and 6mm mild) under power hammer with bearing ball tools.

The candleholders are right out of the fire - sorry for the clumsy picture. You can see the texture better here:

Bests wishes to all:

Gergely

 

Very nice work, Gergely.  I like how you left the edges intact to create something of a frame for the peened area.  I might have to give that go on my next dish!