Back in 01 or 02 I bought a little 10" Delta LA200 on a whim... I think I stumbled across one on sale @ Amazon while searching for something else... anyway, I got the lathe and a crappy set of small chisels, joined a wooturning forum and the addiction began.

There are no woodturning clubs around here so luckily I discovered that I had a knack for turning and I made a couple of online friends on the other forum that helped me out quite a bit. I had to sharpen my tools by hand, cut my wood with hand saws, and the only wood I had available to came out of people's firewood piles.

Not having money for many accessories when I got started, I turned bowls almost exclusively for the first couple of years but over time I've built up about $8K in woodturning tools and accessories, and my wishlist is still expanding... and so is my interest in other types of projects and aspects of the "hobby"

 

As a side note... I still have that worn out little Delta sitting in the corner collecting dust and I still use the crappy turning tools, albeit most of them have been modified and re-purposed. I think this winter I'll rebuild the LA200 and start using it again.

 

 

 

 

 

A friend got me started with making pens. I bought a cheap lathe off craigslist. Sure was glad to upgrade to a jet lathe and good tools. Still learning alot from the Gulf Coast Woodturners. Problem is your wishlist just gets bigger lol.

Happy turning

Dave

I saw the ink pen kits listed in the Woodcraft catalog and thought they would make great Christmas gifts so I bought 3 slimline kits for presents along with the bushings and a spindle gouge. I then built a mandrel from a piece of steel rod and built a turning jig from a block of wood, a bearing and a dowel center for the live center for my drill press. I think the jig was in an old issue of shop notes. Once I turned those 3 pens I turned 5 or 6 more of differing kits and then I was hooked. I bought a JET 1014VS from Woodcraft and I've been using it ever since. I still have the drill press jig in a cabinet somewhere.

I've turned pepper grinders, small bowls, platters, icecream scoops and a pizza cutters as gifts but my mainstay for turning is pens. I'm getting deeper into segmented pen blanks and even have built a pressure pot system for casting blanks. I have wanted a larger lathe for bigger bowls but just haven't scrapped enough money together to get one. Some day!

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www.thepatriotwoodworker.com Proud Supporter of Homes For Our Troops

 Way back in the 8th grade, I took a woodworking class and that teacher taught us how to do many things in the shop including wood lathe turning.

I still have the 3 bowls that I turned that year, 1953. I also have one end table, two small wall shelves and a lamp. That teacher there in La Grande, Oregon was by far the very best shop teacher I ever had.  I did not make that many items in all four years of high school shop here in Phoenix, AZ.

I did not turn much while we were raising our family, but been at it for a long time now.

I have a Jet Mini lathe and also a  NOVA  DVR XP. Love em both.

Like Dave, a friend got me started on pens too. I was pretty much laying around trying to figure out how i was going to make money and help support myself since i can't hold a real job without an employer getting annoyed at my frequent hospital stays. My friend Steve sent me a pen as a gift in late 2009. When i opened the package I stared at the pen for a long time and he told me that he actually made it. Right there I knew what I wanted to do. So I started getting the equipment needed and i have actually enjoyed every minute of it.

This is the pen he sent me first

I soon realized though that pen making was not the only thing I wanted to do, so I have been getting even more tools to support the other interests in turning

I too started with a crappy small set of tools, then got a really crappy set of larger tools on eBay, but recently started replacing those with better ones from actual retailers of great tools like WoodCraft.

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Charles Nicholls
Site Host
nicholls61@att.net
Proud supporter of The Wounded Warrior Project, Homes For Our Troops and the NRA

http://www.etsy.com/shop/nichollswoodworks

An old friend of the family kept after me to come turn a pen.  Many years later I finally did.  That was March of 2011 and I bought a Rikon VS Mini lathe from Woodcraft.  Things have not been the same since.  I now no longer own a boat and my golf clubs are getting rusty.  I am not even sure I remember if I am right or left handed at golf.  I have since acquired a Jet Mini in a deal that I also ended up with a Jet disk\belt sander, delta bandsaw, drill press and grinder.  My list of tools is slowly growing.  I would like to add a planer and drum sander eventually to make boxes.  Of course I am a ways from buying new tools.

Those bloody wishlists are never ending. A miter saw and planer are my latest priorities, but those seem to change from week to week depending on what kind of projects I feel like doing at the time. Of course there are a million things I can be doing with the equipment I already have, but those aren't as appealing to me as the ones that I can not do, or can't do efficiently, with all of the machinery and gadgetry I already own.

I started with a Bridgewood lathe BW-100- after watching "Norm" create some of his projects

along with a set of lesser expensive tool- some of which I still have. Due to the single tube bed, it was difficult to develop jigs accessories. Later bought a Delta lathe.

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Lew Kauffman-
Wood Turners Forum Host

Time traveler. Purveyor of the world's finest custom rolling pins!

I liked making furniture and wanted to be able to add turned legs to my projects. I had someone to ask me to build a table to go in their kitchen.

It was to have four turned legs and the other part square. These were my first turnings other that some pine I put on the lathe to try to figure out how to use the tools.

I made the first leg as was so proud of myself till I realized I had to make three more just like the first one. It sure wouldn't look very good for all of them to be different. So I kept them pretty simple and managed to get them all close enough that it was hard to see much difference in them. I could tell but most people looking at them could not and at least there was a little space between them.

I purchase my lathe from a gentleman I met at First Friday's craft shows. He had just upgraded to a new PowerMatic and had a Jet 1236 to sell for 300.00. He threw in some tools and got me started.

Pens and other things just came along to help me to hone my skills. The funny thing is that table is the first and only one so far I have made with turned legs. I guess I need to get busy and do what I bought it for.

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John Moody
Site Administrator


John Moody Woodworks
http://www.johnmoodywoodworks.com

I was making hardwood bowls by hand and unhappy with the primitive results.  Finally realized if I put them on a lathe, they would be more symmetrical.  Found a 14" swing over bed Grizzly lathe on craigslist for an excellent price.  I had never turned anything before buying this lathe.  With direction and advice from my husband who had turned many items, I started turning bowls.

SQ

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Happiness is wood chips flying!