12 April 2025 Hiawatha Turners Club Meeting, St Ignace High School

 We are back from our winter respite.  Last month the are was struck by freezing rain and high winds and many members lost power or worse suffered damaged to their homes or property.  Even with these troubles many of the members showed up for our 12 April meeting and brought many Bring Backs (items to auction off to fellow members) and many Show and Tell items the members created during the winter break to share with fellow members.  Below are the Bring Back items:

A section of a tree was brought in (small log), several slabs of hard wood along with several finished or partially finished projects.  By the log is a carved bowl with a carved father on the lid.  Front is a plater, a small cherry bowl and two partially turned cherry blanks.  Many members bought a large number of tickets in the hopes their ticket would be drawn and they could choose the item they wanted.  All funds raised by the auction go into the club's treasury.  Some of the funds raised by this method were used to replace our 10 year old HP AMD A-10 processor laptop with a 5 year old HP Zbook with an eight core i9 processor and an Nvidia graphics card.  This improve the clubs ability to record, edit and post pictures and movies to the club's blog.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are some pictures of the members items brought in for Show and Tell.  Each member explained the item and any unique features or turning lessons related to their items.
 

From front to back are some interesting items.  The large front item is flower holder and used double axes turning to obtain its unique shape.  There are three bowls and two lidded vessels.   The large one has segment contrasting wood in the sides.  In the center is a flower with a humming bird.  All are well done.,

 

Here is a better picture of the humming bird.   Behind it is a practice piece used to learn offset turning.

Wood turners and not limited to just turning bowls and boxes.  Here are two side tables.  The left one is epoxy resin with leaves embedded.   The right one is wood and resin.  The shafts were turned as well by the member.  

Let's go down the table from right to left.  A section of wood was turned to preserve the outer beauty of the wood. This require turning the wood with protrusion spinning round to get the inside bowl shape. Center is bowl that was died to add a different character to it.   A small box with a finial.  Lower left is complex approach as a natural edge bowl is turned and then a section of wood is turned thin, soaked in water to soften the wood and then placed inside the bowl.  A rubber glove is then inflated inside the bowl to hole the this wood in place.  Glue is used to bond the thin inner wood to the natural edge bowl for a unique creations. 

 

 

Here is a close up of the bowl where color has been added creating a stunning bowl.

This is a few moving down the table.  Below the bowl with a finial is another natural edged bowl with a thin wood insert.  In the center is a large platter and to its left is another platter.

Moving farther down the tables are some fantastic platters and some small bowls.  

The large object is a ceramic bowl where the member turned wood legs.  Lower right is a natural edged bowl.  To its left is a wood bowl with bird legs on the bottoms.

Here is a unique bowl with a textured inside to look like a basket with a owl painted in the texture.  A really fantastic piece.  Now Jim Rutledge like to carve the bowls he turns and below are some where the bowl looks like a basket and the lid has a carving.  Some are birds and one is a black bear.  Fantastic work.

 

Here Steve Promo is explaining the up coming meetings.  The high school will be remodeling the wood shop this summer so the club will hold meetings else ware.  The June thru August meetings will not be at the high school.  The July and August will have guest presenters.   The September thru November meets will be back at the high school. 

Here is a video of Steve Promo turning a platter/shallow bowl while pointing out some production turning methods.

 

The members thank Steve for not only the demonstration but also for being the club president.

14 December 2024 Club Meeting

 The meeting was held at Sam Staffan's shop and was well attended.  This meeting was not on our calendar of scheduled meetings but there was interest and many people came and brought items they had made.  There were many side discussions on how to do things and a lunch was provided.   Many thanks to Sam for hosting the meeting.

There were no bring backs or formal demonstrations.  Here are some of the very interesting Show and Tell items.

Jim Rutledge brought in some boxes he made with the Hiawatha Sportman's Club   Logo on top.  He also added one of the logo plate to his walking stick.  Nicely done.  

Here is a closer view of the neat boxes Jim made.

Archie Patterson made two bowls from aromatic cedar and two vases from purple heart.  The top cedar bowl is unfinished and retains it aromatic properties while the bottom one was finish with poly which enhanced the color but sealed in the aromatic properties.  Alternative would be to finish the outside and leave the inside unfinished.  The two purple heart vessels are buff finished as the wood is very hard. 

Steve Promo brought in two rough turned bowls.  Rule he used is for every inch of diameter leave 10% in wall thickness so the bowl can dry and you will then be able to re-turn the bowl to finished state in about two or three years.   Bottom is a finish bowl.

Here Steve is explaining how to turn a platter from a slab section of a log.  During the lumber milling process the outer sections of the log are cut off and discarded.  Steve saves this sections and turns very nice platters from them.  At the end of the meeting Steve gave away several of the slabs of wood for members to take home and turn platters. 

Here are some really nice boxes and a bowl.

Here is a box with accent added and a hollow form made from four sections of wood turned twice.  First, the sections are grouped as four strips togetherand one side is turned and then the sections are rotated 180 degrees and the other side is turned.  The sections are then reassembled and finished.

Here are some platters and a burl bowl.  The platters are made from the slab cuts from a log.  See above.

This is a bowl made from a Burl.   As often happens not only is the wood patter beautiful but there are voids where the tree grew around a fault.  Still makes a wonderful bowl. 

Close up of the burl bowl showing the faults.

 

 

There was an impromptu demonstrations of a portable winch that is great help in moving large logs from the woods and onto trailers.  The winch is called a Baby Winch.

Sam demonstrated how you can move a large log from the woods to and onto your trailer using this baby winch and a cordless drill.  Make sure you have several batteries.  This version has a woven cord and the button shown allows you to release the cable and then rewind the cable using a drill motor connected to the drive shaft on the other side.  The description on Amazon.com reads: 

Portable Drill Winch of 1000 LB, Red Handheld Drill Winch with 40 Foot Synthetic Rope, Rotate The Hook 360 Degrees, for Lifting & Dragging(Red).

Sam explained that instead of hurting your back trying to roll, drag or flip a heavy log you can connect the winch to a tree and then to your log and using a cordless drill motor drag the log 40' at a time and then into your trailer, which Sam has done.  Much better then the manual come-along many people have.  

It was a great meeting and everyone learned something by sharing their knowledge.   Thanks again Sam and to everyone that came.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our friends. 

Steve Promo's Cherry Salad Bowls

 Steve receive a contract to make salad bowls.  He made 14 Cherry Salad Bowls and they look great.

Submitted 22 November 2024.

 

9 November 2024 Club Meeting

This was the last meeting of 2024 and we had a great turn out of members who brought lots of samples of their turnings and some nice bring backs for our raffle.  

Ash outer cut slab.  Steve said you can make some really nice edged bowls from it.

These are some great bring backs that were raffled off during the meeting.  Left is a section of Ash, behind that is a crouch of a tree, to its right is a burl.  Four turnings and a decorative center piece were also brought backs.  

Sam Staffan made the chess set for his son.  All hand made with pieces turned on the lathe and carved.
Other items are decorative segmented pieces.  

More of Sam's great work.

Here is a close up of Sam's segmented turnings.  

More of Sam's ornamental segmented turnings.

Sam brought in some pieces that illustrate how he made the ornamental segment turnings.  
Left is four sections taped together and turned for the inside.   The four sections are turned so the turned outer edges are facing inward and turned for the outside like the second from left.  Next over to the right are the loose sections that would make up the pieces with the inside turned along with some finished pieces.  

The two bows on the left are from Kate and the top three are from Jim Rutledge.

Jim is a master carver and here is a humming bird perched on a stick on the lid of a nicely turned box.   

Here is another wonderful creation from Jim.   A turned bowl made to look like a woven basket with carved feathers in the bottom.  The feathers look so real.  Nice work Jim.

Next to one of Kate's outstanding bowls and another box from Jim with a wonderful bird on the lid.  

Here are two of Kate's fantastic spalted bowls in a natural edge design.  

A beautiful bowl on the left next to a fantastic box.  

Here is a look down the rest of the table loaded with fantastic objects from our members.  

Steve Promo brought in this segmented bowl.  

Here is another of Steve's segmented bowls.  

This a solid wood vase with fantastic wood color. An insert is placed in the vase for a flower.  A real beauty.  

Here are some of Archie Patterson's turnings.  Left is a small mallet.  The bowel on the top was clamped into chuck and the bottom was finished.  However, the furnace came on and the bowl could not expand so it cracked.   Bottom are two domed boxes.  

This is Archie's Orange Agate bowl with a outwardly turned lip and a Ebony wood base.   The finish is buffed CA glue.

In the last issue of Woodturners Magazine there was an article about turning domed boxes with tops reminiscent of the domed buildings of the Middle East and Russia.   After reading the article Archie made these with gold colored hollowed tops and and a dark wood accent piece on the side.  

Here is a nifty pitcher with lid and leather strap handle.  

The photograph does not do justice to these two very large and very beautiful Cherry bowls.  

Placed at the end of the table were these, not to be overlooked, treasures.  Back is a paper towel holder, right is a bowl and left are three biscuit cutters.  

After show and tell Steve Promo talked about making a laser holder for our boring bars.  This was part four of a series where members made the boring bars, a boring bar support and steady rests.  To determine the wall thickness of the turnings a laser can be used to point, say 1/4" from the cutter.  When the laser dot reaches the work's edge you have reached your desired thickness.  In the following movie Jim will explain about using the laser and the making of the laser holder, then he will turn the vertical stand for the laser holder.  Following the movie there are some pictures to further show what was done.  Enjoy.

Do to technical difficulties there is no sound during the turning.  Comments were added to help clarify what was happening in the movie.   

This is the finished laser holder mounted on a boring bar.  The laser is an inexpensive unit from a local hard ware store often used to play with cats.  Jim uses a clothes pin to hold the laser button down to keep the laser on.

This is the top mount bracket with a wing nut to tighten the grip on the laser holding bar.  There is also a wing nut on the back side so you can adjust the height.

If you cut the hole just right the laser will be a press fit.  If loose a little hot glue will hold it steady.

To make the top bracket Jim took a block of wood and marked where he wanted the holes for the shafts and for the holding bolts and drilled the holes.   Jim also marked the square for the laser shaft.  The slits are cut on a band saw and a band saw was used to square the hole for the laser shaft.

Here you can see how Jim marked the hole to be made square.  

A round hole made square.  

Other ways to make a laser hold.

This one was made of metal using a garden hook with a mounted a gun sight laser on the end.  

This was also made of wood using 3/4" hardwood dowels glued into holes drilled into the mounting blocks.  The laser is fasten to a block held in place by a thumb screw and can be adjusted fore and aft as well as up and down and left and right.  

An alternative is to buy a commercial laser holder on a commercial boring bar such as the one demonstrated by a Lyle Jamerson representative at one of our club meetings.