I taught myself to pull canes from my baby caladra kiln and have several "disks" that ive fused - I made them into nice circles - this one is 14" and now i want to put a nice bevel edge on it. Here come the dumb question- do you bevel the forward edge that will be the face of the bowl? I have a used large wet belt sander and a used 24 inch flat lap. I have put hours of work into these and don't want to ruin them- is there a trick to putting a nice bevel on them? Thats just a marker around it.
lastly, I sandblasted the bottom already- is it better to wait til after the bevel to sandblast?
Assuming that you're slumping into a mold, you want to bevel the back. Not only does it look nicer, more finished, it facilitates the slumping process. I would sandblast first, then bevel, so the bevel is shiny. You only need a small bevel, 1/16" to 1/8" to give the bowl a professional appearance.
Further . . . beveling on a WBS takes a little practice. Hole the blank, top down, against the belt, resting on the wheels. Slowly rotate it, easing in and out of the motion, taking several turns to complete a rotation. Use an 80 or 100 belt to rough the shape, then go through 220, 400, 600, Cork until finished.
Practice on some scrap, it's actually easy, but you have to develop a touch . . .
If you have a flat lap, I have found it relatively easy to bevel the edges of rounds on one (you probably don't, since you are mentioning WBS). I'm not very GOOD at it, but the motion itself is fluid and natural. (Don't know about the WBS; never worked on one.)
Good luck, I bet it will be a lovely finished piece.
Here is a photo of my practice disk - its the back = so should the bevel be shorter on the back? What i mean is if you measured the disk after the bevel the front would be a hair bigger? or is it the opposite?
