I attempted to make a bowl on my lathe with my four jaw chuck. To say that I am still climbing the learning curve would be most accurate. I did use my band saw to trim the block close to round and remove the sharp corners, but I couldn’t get it set solid in the chuck, it kept slipping out of round. So I used four small screws and attached it to a face plate instead of using the chuck. That worked much better for this piece of wood. I was able to rough in a bowl shape, but then things took a turn for the worse. It turns out that the burl block had a fissure running through that split as I began to hollow out the bowl. (The turning puns will probably continue, just so you know.)

I probably stood there with the bits in my hand for a good five minutes assessing the damage. Then I carefully removed the piece from the lathe, stored the screws, and put the burl halves in my wood bin. I cannot currently conceive of rescuing a bowl from the wood, but burls are precious and can be beautiful, so maybe there will be some future turnings that can be salvaged. I think it is time to try something else for awhile, and let the trauma of an exploded burl rest.