There are still a few days remaining to help with our Wounded Warrior Family Adoption project. If you haven't made your donation, yet, please see this link-

 

https://thepatriotwoodworker.com/forums/topic/27849-the-patriot-woodworkers-with-operation-ward-57-adopt-a-wounded-warrior-family-for-the-holidays-2019

 

Been thinking that maybe I might get started on Christmas shopping, next week...maybe...

 

 

Our Patriot Turners-

Our members have been really active this week. Lots pf projects and comments-

 

@Ron Altier has been working on ornaments. He posted three of his latests creations-

 

Ron's post has more details on how these were made-

 

 

Unfortunately for Ron, not all the attempts turned out as he expected. One of his acrylic pieces didn't hold up-

 

He received some interesting comments and suggestions to his post about this failure-

 

One of the comments was from @Woodbutcherbynight who suggested he might try Corian materials and posted some of his fantastic pens that use that material-

 

 

 

@Woodbutcherbynight also showed us some of the fan pulls he is making. The little beauties are really something!

 

Here's his post on them-

 

Gunny is the big winner this week with the most posts! He turned beautiful segmented bases for wine and champagne glasses.

 

You can see how he did the glue-ups and turning in his posts-

 

This shows his clamping jig-

 

 

We have a revival of an older post. Back in the summer @John Morris asked if any of our members were familiar with the Ringmaster turning device. At that time he received a bunch of input. Some of our newer members recently discovered the post and have added to it. Check it out and see what's new!

 

 

 

@Pauley asked for help and ideas on dust collection. Seems he is turning Bubinga and needed some advice on how to handle the dust and chips. Please head on over to his post and see if you can give him some ideas-

 

 

 

@Gerald is holding us in suspense waiting to see the item he creates from a piece of Azobe wood. He was gifted the wood from a turner friend. Check this topic to see more about the wood!

 

 

 

What’s Coming Up-

This weeks club-

 

http://www.lasvegaswoodturners.com/

 

 

 

For The Newbies-

AS your turning experiences expand from spindle work to bowls and hollow vessels, it becomes necessary to be able to gauge the thickness of the walls of your turnings. Some turnings, i.e. shallow bowls, you can use your fingers to determine the thickness. But, as the depth increases, differents tools have to be used. Here is a video, from Sam Angelo, on making wall thickness gauges-

 

 

 

Expand Your Horizons-

Photographing your turnings can be challenging and frustrating. Member @Gerald has an excellent blog on photography and you can check it out at-

 

 

I recently came across a video from Mike Peace on this subject. He shows us some of the shop made items we can use to help make our photos a little better.

 

 

Also, Rick Turns has his November You Tube video listing available-

 

 

 

 

New Turning Items-

Woodturners Wonders has a sale on their Wonder Weave sanding discs

 

https://woodturnerswonders.com/collections/specials

 

 

Everything Else-

The latest edition of the Woodturning OnLine newsletter arrived. There is a link to a really great article on vacuum chuck systems.

https://www.woodturningonline.com/

 

When I turn a utilitarian bowl, I usually use a recess for the jaws- just the way I learned and I find the bottom foot is a little larger. However, the recess makes it more difficult to judge the thickness of the bottom. While looking at Sam Angelo's wall thickness gauges, I found a video he posted on a nice, shop made jig that accurately measures the bottom thickness on recess and tenon methods.

 

My version mimics his with only minor additions-

 

 

The fixed headstock spacer-

 

 

 

The movable depth indicator-

 

 

 

 

 

 

Calibrating the fixed spacer-

The end of the spacer is set to be on the same plane as the end of the chuck/jaws being used

 

Calibrating the movable depth indicator-

The threaded rod is adjusted to be on the same plane as the base of the movable portion-

 

 

When correctly calibrated, the depth rod will touch the jaw surface when the bottom sliding part touches the fixed part.

 

 

To use, position the threaded rod against the bottom of the turning. Observe the space between the fix and sliding parts of the jig. The distance is the thickness of the bottom of the turning.

 

 

Here is Mr. Angelo's video-

 

 

Safe turning

 

 

Edited December 19, 20196 yr by lew

Guess we were rather busy this week.  

 

A interesting jig.  Have not tried my hand at bowls yet but ya never know.

 

 

Lew that was a loong post . And many good ideas. I have the same depth jig but the point for bottom is wood . Think I like the allthread better. It does work very well and is easy to set up. Oh by the way the only chucks I use are SN2 so all the same depth, but as you showed you do need a different head stock measure on each lathe and that is a cool idea for adjustable. Keep up the good work

Lots of material this week.  Especially liked the bottom depth gauge from Sam Angelo. 

 A lot of information & great looking project from all. Thanks Lew for the review.

@Woodbutcherbynight Thanks! Bowl turning will open up a whole new range of projects/gifts!

 

@Gerald Thank You! 

 

@HandyDan Thanks! 

 

@DuckSoup Thank You!

 

Thanks for all of the great input and comments over the past year. I really appreciate it! 

Also, thanks to all of the turners who take the time to post their work here. It really helps keep this weekly get together going.

Have to find someone that does them and get some hands on practice.

1 hour ago, Woodbutcherbynight said:

Have to find someone that does them and get some hands on practice.

Gunny bowls are not that hard and once started you can do lots of different things to them. Capti Eddie has a good bowl video and look at Tim Yoder too. Another good place to look is Stuart Batty's  Seven Fundamentals of Woodturning .

     You will not see any Carbide in Stuart's videos but will learn many fundamental techniques I could not begin to explain but would have to demonstrate.

I am working on finding someone that does it locally.  Even have a few bowl gouges I have sharpened but never used.