Wednesday's Wisdom For Woodturners October 19, 2022

[lew]

Frantic week here, unfortunately absolutely no time at the lathe.

 

 

Our Patriot Turners-

@RustyFN rough turned a bunch of bowls-

 

In his post he tells us about the type of wood and shows us some of the blanks-

 

Rusty also finished a beautiful mahogany bowl

 

Check out the nice comments by our turners-

 

 

Last week, @forty_caliber picked up some really nice bowl blanks. He created some awesome pieces from them

 

Check out more from his continued post-

 

 

What’s Coming Up-

Lots happening in the near future. Click on the images for links to more information and registration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For The Newbies-

This is copied and pasted from Ron Brown's latest newsletter. Good advice for new turners when selecting tools.

Should You Use A Butter Knife For Everything?

 

Why not? Because there are times when a butter knife just won’t cut it. Sometimes you need a butcher knife to cut up chicken, steak, or a pork roast. You might need to peel a potato or an apple or cut up ingredients for a chunky salad.

 

It is the same thing with lathe tools. Sometimes you need to slice, other times you need to scrape, and sometimes you just need to make a lot of material go away. When I first began to learn about turning, my turning buddies thought the key to turning like the professionals was having their tool with their grind. So, I bought a new tool with every new demonstration I watched. Turns out, it isn’t the tool!

 

I began to analyze High-Speed Steel lathe tools and it didn’t take long to realize that there are only 6 basic categories for HSS tools; 7 if you include tools for hollowing. There are many different sizes within each category and many different grinds within each category. I even developed a helpful chart so you can better visualize each one.

 

I’ve made it available as an Instant Free Download here: We call it “Turner’s Reference Guide.” You will have to be registered, also free, and logged into your account. I recommend you print this out and post it in your shop.

 

My recommendation is to acquire a limited number of HSS tools in each category and add different sizes and grinds as you need them. Simply having 100 HSS turning tools doesn’t make you a better turner. This I found out the hard way.

 

Here's the link to register for Mr. Brown's newsletter. Once registered, you can download the reference guide mentioned above. "It's Free"!!

https://www.ronbrownsbest.com/index.php?route=account/register

 

 

Want to expand your creativity? A video from the AAW on turning a mushroom-

 

 

Turned beads are a great way to add interest to almost any turning. In this video, Mike Peace demonstrates some of the tools for turning beads-

 

 

Turning a bowl from a log can be done several ways and it's always good to see the method used by other turners. Here Kent Weakley demonstrates his style- 

 

 

And, Richard Raffan's method-

 

 

 

Expand Your Horizons-

Need to turn a thin spindle? Jim Echter shows how it's done. Awesome skew work!!

 

 

Always fun to watch Mike Waldt create a new item. This is part 1 of an elderberry vase.

 

 

 

Yet another scoop version from Alan Stratton-

 

 

I happened upon this on a social media site. We are always looking for food safe methods of finishing turnings. This may, or may not, be an effective but it sure is interesting. This is a copy and paste from Debbie Coull's Instagram post ( https://www.instagram.com/p/Cj3BgYgjbrC/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY%3D )  so all can read it.

 

"Sealing a food safe vessel with hot milk. No idea of the exact process as I struggled to get anything online for doing this with wood. Lots about how to do it with earthenware.
So, since this is an ancient technique, I figured, keep it simple.
Sycamore cereal bowl (hopefully), turned and sanded to 320. Exterior sealed with wax, interior left naked (I know the wax exterior will wash off after it's been in use and washed). Milk was heated till I burned the tip of my finger, then poured in till it lipped the rim. Now leaving it to cool.

The process requires the casein protein in the milk penetrating and sealing the wood grain.

I know there will be several folk comment about the milk going rancid, but I'm trusting the process. If it didn't work, then it wouldn't have been practiced for centuries."
 

New Turning Items-

Woodturners Wonders has expanded their product line to include CA adhesives. You can check out their complete selection at-

https://woodturnerswonders.com/collections/adhesives

 

 

Everything Else-

Rick Turns list of YouTube woodturning videos from last week-

 

 

Safe turning

Edited October 19, 2022 by lew

[HandyDan]

Thanks Lew.  I like seeing the holiday ideas it's that time of year.  I have been playing with some mushrooms lately just for the fun of it.  Had never turned any before.  It is fun.

[RustyFN]

Thanks Lew.

[forty_caliber]

Thank you for all your hard work putting this together for us. 

 

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[Gerald]

Thanks for the post Lew. I found the milk idea interesting but think I will stick with modern methods.

[lew]

@HandyDan Thank You!

 

@RustyFN Thanks!

 

@forty_caliber Thank You!

 

@Gerald  Thanks! I'm with you on the milk thing!