It's Blogtastic!: Lancia Gialla

Finished Lancia Gialla last evening. Just a buff and name stamp tonight and tomorrow it will be off to it's new owner!

It has been a fun one to make! Lessons learned of course, but still great enjoyment. It began as an homage to a beautiful WØ Larsen bulldog I own. A partial blast, deep and dark with a nice 'virgin' section of bare briar on the diamond shank. A smaller pipe, but extremely classy.

This block was the first of the [assumed] Tracy Mincer briar I won on ebay. Reported to be aged to the 1970's, if not back to the '50's it is extremely light briar. I turned the block 90º from the original cut, in an attempt to get some of the handsome birdseye you see on the top of the bowl. I didn't get full straight grain around the sides, but it is still quite attractive.

After drilling the block, I moved on to the yellowheart extension. I obtained it in a sampler 'pen blank' set from WoodCraft. I wanted to mirror the birdseye I got from the bowl in the extension, so I carefully positioned the yellowheart section on end and drilled the draft hole. Next I drilled the two mortises, one to receive the stem's tenon and one for the thin band's tenon I was to place as a divider between the extension and stummel. After that I turned a section of ebonite as the band and tried to glue it in the stummel. I used 8 second CA glue, but I think the label lied. As soon as the band's tenon touched the stummel it froze. Right about halfway in....great. I tried to use a debonding agent with no luck, even heating and cooling the pieces to get it to release. After working for about an hour to try and save it, I broke it off and re-drilled the mortise. I turned a new piece and reattempted gluing it, this time successfully. Whew! What a relief!

I chucked a spindle in the lathe and began to shape the bowl, just roughing it in before I started with the disc sander. Unfortunately, I had forgotten the original pipe and was cutting from memory. Needless to say, my memory failed me. The angle on the top of the bowl was far too flat and subsequently the undercut on the bottom was off as well. I wondered if I could save it. So, I headed to the sander. After some manipulation, I was able to redeem it and make the shape you see now. I guess it's a mixture of rhodesian and bulldog.

I kept the diamond shank thin, thinner than the Larsen. It mimics the look of a sword or lance blade with sharp, crisp edges. This honed edged is carried onto the bowl giving a distinct line change between the side and top of the bowl.

To pay homage to the yellowheart extension, I used a dark brown base stain offset by canary yellow. The yellow was muted by the briar as it has a fairly dark complexion, but it still peeks through.