Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from our Gnomes !

Platter

Recent work.  A 12 inch platter turned from a piece of Corkscrew Willow.  I did a little burning on this one.  The pattern is a branch of a willow.  The finish is walnut oil.

Ducks Unlimited

Our local chapter of Ducks Unlimited is having their annual banquet next week.  I typically donate a turning or two to the cause.

This year I am giving them a duck call.  The call is a double reed call turned from cocobolo and purple heart.

I also did a set of bowls.  The bowls are a 3 piece set where the smaller bowls were cored from the larger bowl.  The wood is maple and the finish is walnut oil.  The larger bowl is about 9 1/2" in diameter.

I will be very interested to see how much the turnings bring in.  

Recent Club Meeting

Below are some cell phone snap shots from our show and tell table at our club's most recent meeting. The comment was made , and supported by others, that the quality of the work being shown has improved in leaps and bounds. See for yourself. 

Recent Efforts

Needed a gift for an upcoming wedding and I was presented with a few boxes of turning blanks.
So I found a few spare hours to spend on the lathe.
 Below is the gift set.  A cocktail shaker, a chiller for white wine, a coaster for red wine and a bottle stopper.  I really like making this set.  The bad news is the supply of the inserts for the cocktail shaker is dried up.  I can't find them anywhere.
The wood is a staved construction using cherry with a walnut spacer.  The bottle stopper is solid walnut.

A group of bottle stoppers.  Mesquite, cherry and walnut.

More chillers. Both from cherry.  The one on the right is staved.  The coaster is from the cut off of the chiller blank.

From the bunch of turning blanks I received I found this Black Locust blank.  The blank was cut with the pith left in and as a result had some light cracks. It was too pretty to not use it for something.  Gloria was looking for a bowl about this size so I used some brown CA glue on the cracks and turned this bowl from it.  It is for our own use so we will see how it holds up.  Walnut oil finish and is about 6 inches in diameter.

August Meeting

Our August meeting was actually a workshop.  The club purchased several Scratch Awl kits and Steve, Jim, and Hank got blanks ready and glued the brass tubes into the blanks.
Then at the meeting 4 lathes were set up ready to go.  Members could then take a turn on a lathe and turn their blanks into handles for the awls.  Jim and Steve were available as a mentor for anyone needing any guidance.  I thought it was a great event.

Below (if this works) is a short video showing how it went off.

 Give it a little time to load.  You should be able to make the video screen larger by clicking the small box in the lower right corner of the viewer.

Edit:
Just before the movie viewer is a link to an online version of the movie.  This will provide a little better quality video and it is the only way to see the video on an iPad.

Link to online version

Mesquite

A neighbor came back from Arizona with a chunk of mesquite.  Once I cut it open on the bandsaw I saw It had a lot of voids and cracks. 

I turned an open vessel out of the one half. The voids were filled with Inlace Resin and crushed turquoise.  The second one was turned as a bowl after a "design opportunity " presented its self. 

The finish is Danish Oil. 

Pictures below. 

Nite-Lights

After Steve's Demo in June, I did make a few night lights. They are pictured below. There was one more but it became a gift for my nephews daughter before I got a picture of it. 

For those that missed Steve's demo the shades are turned from fresh cut green wood. They are turned with the walls as thin as you can get them. 

I did a little burning on mine. The one not pictured had a somewhat whimsical flower on it. 

Video of a lathe accident.

Below is a very short video of a catch and the piece coming out of the jaws. It's only 35 seconds long. 

Oops I copied the link at the end of the clip, so you may need to drag the play head to the left to see the beginning. Sorry about that. 

http://youtu.be/X21B_ViwsL0

Workshop Envy

Click here

Above is a link to the new workshop at Craft Supply. Looks pretty nice.
A bit of a drive to take a class though!

More Turnings

Click Here for slideshow

Above is a link to another slideshow.  Not my photographs or editing.
This person had a lot more time to photograph turnings and obviously Made it to  the galleries before Sunday, as there are more pieces to see.
The movie appears to be 55 minutes long, so you have been warned. :)
Tom

Symposium Slide Show

Click Here for Slideshow

Above is a link to a quick slide show highlighting some of the turnings on displayed at the recent AAW Symposium in Pittsburg.

Because I was busy running camera at 7 rotations and sat in on 3 other demonstrations I didn't have a chance to get into the Instant Gallery until late Sunday morning.  By that time a lot of the pieces on display were picked up by the turners.  So this is what was left.

edit: the AAW has 15,000 members worldwide, 10 % of the members were registered to attend the symposium.

Missing today's meeting

Well I am missing another monthly meeting. We have been traveling in Florida and I have missed the last few meetings. 

On our way back to Michigan we stopped off in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park fora few days. While there I made it a point to see "Arrowmont" the wood turners Meca. 

It was interesting to see the gallery and the shops. I have included some pictures below. 

Interesting video

Hi fellow turners. While spending a foggy morning in Florida , I Stumbled on this video  of a way to get flat bowl ( and other ) blanks using a chainsaw.

http://youtu.be/-JCwwCxkROw

February Meeting

Below are some pictures from the show and tell table at our most recent meeting. 

 

New dishes for the RV

Gloria had requested new dishes for the camper.  We have always used regular household dishes in our camper.  This required a layer of a foam material between each dish and bowl.  To keep them from breaking as we traveled down the road.  I have seen references to the forces inside an RV traveling down the highways and byways of our county being equal to a 3.8 magnitude earthquake.  I think that could be an understatement based on the roads we traveled.
Our new dishes are wood.  No need for a layer of foam between each dish and at 7 1/4 pounds for the whole set, I think they are substantially lighter than our old dishes.
A couple of other woodturners I know eat off wooden plates and bowls all of the time, no issues.  We have been traveling with wooden bowls for years and they worked out well for us.  So we have a place setting for 4 and we are ready to go.
Plus I love anything wood.

Most everything is maple, the larger plates are birdseye maple. One small plate is beech and one bowl is from cherry.  The finish is walnut oil.  But even if someone is allergic to walnuts, this finish is not likely to cause any type of reaction because of the processes involved with making the finish.  This is not the same as buying walnut oil in the grocery store.  I tried that oil and it will not dry......ever.

The future is now !

Below is a link to a short video on an new computer guided system for hollowing and duplicating. 

I am suspicious of this product, mostly because the presenters shop is way to neat and organized. It doesn't look like much work gets done in there. 

http://youtu.be/xVpp9zHTXEE