13 April 2024 Club Meeting

 This was the first meeting of the Hiawatha Wood Turners Club in 2024 and there were many in attendance.  Many brought samples of items they created since the last meeting in the fall of 2023 along with many bring backs to be auctioned off.  Here are some pictures of the items on the tables in the class room.  

Bring Backs for Auction.

Fantastic bead work by Jim Rutledge.

Some of Sam's fantastic work
The flowers are turned and carved.  

Cutting boards, thin turned lamp shade and vessels.

The duck was very good and stayed quit the whole meeting.

Some bowl gouges Steve Promo brought in to sell.

Two Bowl and a box by Archie Patterson.

Fantastic turned and carved vessels.

Two neat bowls.  One sold at action.  
Bowl on right has a pointed bottom so it roll

At the meeting Steve Promo talked about the grind angle of a round nose scrapper.  Here is a short video of his discussion.

Sam Staffan presented two very nice projects and had pictures to explain the process he used to make them.  Here is his video.  

Steve Promo talked abut making wood lamp shades and later did a demo on a lathe.  The following is the classroom meeting discussion.

 

Steve turns a lampshade from a log of green wood.  He marks one end with a 4" can lid and cuts a cone with a chain saw.  He then mounts the section between centers and rough turns a cone.  Since the wood he is using has a dark center section of wood the cone shape will allow for the darker wood to be seen at the base of the lamp shade. 

The wood is green and Steve gets lots of nice shavings.  As he turns he stops and sprays the wood with water to keep it wet.  Comment during the meeting was to make sure you wipe down your lathe afterwards to prevent rust. 

As he works to the shape he wants he leaves a section for a chuck to grab onto.  

With the small end mounted to a chuck and the big end stabilized with the tail stock live center he trues up the big end.  

Here Steve has hollowed back one inch using a bright light a a guide for the thickness.  The is cut to a thickness of 0.010 inch.  

This is a close up of the thin area.  Note the darker section farther in.   That will be cut next.   Steve says you can never go back over a prior section as the wood is so thin it bends.  

This is the second inch cut back.  As he gets closer to the center the wood he is using has a brown center which adds a nice contrast.  However, Steve points out that the light coming thru the brown wood should never be as bright as the lighter wood for the same thickness.  

Here is a finished shade with a light inside that shows the grain and darker center section of the wood the cone shape exposes.  

Steve takes a branch of a tree and uses a reciprocating saw to cut it in half down the center.   Then he cuts a grove with a router for the wires.  At the top he glues in lamp mounts.  On the bottom you can see he used a log tenon cutter for the base so he can attach it to a hole in a base plate.

The next step is to glue the two halfs back together.  After the glue sets the wood is sanded and finished.  

Steve mass produces bases by laminating sections of wood together and then turning them to the shape.  The bases have to have enough weight to hold the lamp up.  

Here is the finished base with the lamp installed.  The wires come down each branch and in the base Steve puts a junction box for the wires to connect to a cord that runs to a plug.  

This Steve's finished lamp.  Each shade has a pull chain switch and Steve likse to add a connection section so people can put things on it.  While turning Steve sprays the shades to keep them from drying out.  The finished shades have two coats of boiled linseed oil.  This helps the light come thru and will keep the sades flexible.  

 Here is a table lamp using the turned shade.   It has a yellow birch shade and a local cedar middle with a mahogany base.  Very beautiful, Steve.

Very impressive Steve.  A really great product made with great skill.  Thanks for sharing.