# Sorby Texturing tool



## firehawkmph (Apr 26, 2008)

I bought this tool last November and hung it up and forgot about it. So today I went out to the shop and grabbed a piece of big leaf maple to make a bowl. I turned the outside and left a rim on the side to try the spiralling cutter on. I was at the Hartville Hardware tool sale yesterday and the English bloke from Sorby's was there demoing all their tools. So he gladly showed me how to use the spiral cutter.
It really isn't that hard and is actually a lot of fun. Also while roughing out the bowl's outside, I decided to compare one of the Easy Wood cutters to a traditional Sorby bowl gouge. The EW tool shaped the bowl easily enough, but left an unacceptable amount of tearout. I made a couple more cuts with the bowl gouge and left a smooth surface good enough to start sanding at 240. I am considering returning the EW tools I bought. I think a person would be much better off learning how to use traditional tools properly than trying to short cut it with these carbide-tipped scrapers. 
Anyway, the bowl turned out nice, the Daytona 500 was a disgrace of a race, and the Sorby tool was a success. 
Mike Hawkins


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## H. A. S. (Sep 23, 2010)

Very nice form!:thumbsup:

That tool is another one they borrowed from metalworking. Just like a knurling tool, only different teeth.


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## tcleve4911 (Dec 16, 2006)

Beautiful bowl, Mike
I'm a real noobe at turning.
I read with interest about the Easy Wood tools
I thought it was a great idea and even saw from a past thread that you were using them 

Now you say that you're dissatisfied with it.
Was it because it wasn't sharp?
.....the nature of the grain of the wood?

I have a pro con list going before I lay down my $100.00 for my first bowl gouge.

Love your work...
TC


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## Kenbo (Sep 16, 2008)

Wow, that is gorgeous Mike. I love the grain and the texturing at the top ridge just makes the whole bowl pop. Awesome work as always good sir. You constantly are outdoing yourself! :thumbsup:


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## john lucas (Sep 18, 2007)

Good job on the spiraling. I have a spiraling tool and never got it to work acceptably. After talking to Micheal Mocho I think I know the problem. The person before me sharpened it wrong and I just agravated the problem because I didn't know what it should look like. Now that I have a metal lathe I think I can reshape the cutters and get a clean edge. As soon as I get all this personal stuff taken care of and can get back in the shop I'm going to give it a try again.


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## firehawkmph (Apr 26, 2008)

tcleve4911 said:


> Beautiful bowl, Mike
> I'm a real noobe at turning.
> I read with interest about the Easy Wood tools
> I thought it was a great idea and even saw from a past thread that you were using them
> ...


TC,
On certain woods, they will work. Hard, close grained wood. I have tried them on several different woods, awful on box elder, which is on the soft side. I thought they would work on this maple, but you can see in the first pic they didn't. When I saw the owner of the company doing a demo at Hartville last November, he obviously made them look easy. The woods he chose gave a nice finish. The carbide cutters are very sharp, but you have to remember, they are glorified scrapers. If you have a scraper and present it straight on with the handle slightly lifted, it will tear grain on certain woods as well. Get yourself a good bowl gouge and practice with it. You can present it in many different ways and get good results if it is kept sharp. I am going to look into returning the easy wood tools I bought. I don't feel they are worth the money.
Mike Hawkins


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## Michael Short (Nov 10, 2007)

The texturing really complimented the bowl. Very nice.


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## momomo6789 (Jul 17, 2010)

i had the same thing happen on some box elder long time ago it was so bad it took the wall thickness down to under 1/4th closer to 1/8th but i do like them for all the rough work i also sharpen mine 2 3 5 8 10 12k grit before i do a bowl takes about 1 min to do this. making only 2 or 3 light finishing pass's with a 3/8 v bowl gouge keeps it nice and sharp for weeks of use, i hate to sharpen tools while doing bowls i do a lot of +12'' bowls, get it going on the inside @ 800 rpm and the bowls done in under 10 mins. also it works amazingly on burls with lots of big voids no catches is always nice im still waiting for a tool that can replace a good old v bowl gouge doubt that will happen anytime soon also the learning curve on large v bowls gouges is pretty simple took me about 10 mins to figure it out about 5 bowls to get a really good finished surface. i use a Thompson 5/8 v gouge I'm a sucker for powder coated tools.

what speed do you use the texturing tool at ?


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## firehawkmph (Apr 26, 2008)

Momo,
The larger the diameter, the slower you go, according to the sorby rep. For the bowl I was at 350 rpms. Doug Thompson makes great tools. I have 5 of his tools. He's a member of our turning club. 
Mike Hawkins


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## jdixon (Nov 21, 2007)

Mike that is a beautiful bowl and a gorgeous piece of wood. I got to see the english bloke, aka Clive Brooks, from Sorby last week too. It was an interesting demo he did on all the different Sorby tools. Makes you want to buy them all.

Time and money, all I need is more time and money.:laughing:

John


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## ACP (Jan 24, 2009)

Wow, very nice results. That is a nice bowl!


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## robert421960 (Dec 9, 2010)

beautiful bowl
love the texturing
love it all:thumbsup:


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## Bob Willing (Jul 4, 2008)

Mike great looking bowl.

I have had the same problem with the EW tools on spindle turns, but I usally finish up with my spindle gouge to get a good tear free finish. I have also found that on some woods you can get a quality finish with the EW tool but on cross grains for get it :thumbdown: I also get a lot of chatter with it on end grains.

I have use the Sorby textureing tool and I use the mini version. It is easy to screw up the spiral design that you used. I used it on a couple of turkey calls and it turned out "OK"!


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## firehawkmph (Apr 26, 2008)

Bob,
The Sorby rep told me that sometimes you will get a doublestrike in the pattern. That's why they tell you to lightly score the wood with it and check first before cutting deeper. Didn't understand why at the time. When doing this bowl, I tried to put a spiral on the top edge and twice ended up with the doublestrike. It sunk in then. The spiral has to go all the way around the bowl edge and rejoin itself. This is controlled by the diameter of the piece. On a spindle turning, you can take a small cut to get rid of the doublestrike, hence, changing the diameter slightly, and end up with a good pattern. Pretty interesting.
Mike Hawkins


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## Jeff4woodturning (Feb 1, 2009)

Great job Mike, Glad to hear you took it down, blew off the dust and went to town....Beautiful bowl!


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## don716 (Mar 1, 2008)

Great turn out on the bowl. I wish they would demo those texturing tools around here. I would probally look hard at buying one.
Donny


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## firehawkmph (Apr 26, 2008)

don716 said:


> Great turn out on the bowl. I wish they would demo those texturing tools around here. I would probally look hard at buying one.
> Donny


Donny,
Do you have a Woodcraft or Rockler store anywhere near you? Or a woodturning club? We have had the sorby rep come to our turning club and do a couple hour demo of all their tools. The local woodcraft store by me did the same thing. Usually when the rep comes around, the sorby tools are on sale at 20% off.
Mike Hawkins


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