Wednesday's Wisdom for Woodturners November 2, 2022

[lew]

Can you believe it? November already!!

 

 

Our Patriot Turners-

@Steve Krumanaker Finished up his turned, carved and pyro embellished platter. It is incredible-

 

Check out this post for other images and the positive comments from our turners-

 

Steve also showed us some really special ornaments he turned from his scrap bin-

 

I really love these birdhouses! Included in his post is an image of some really nide ornament display stands. Check it out-

 

 

@Ron Altier created an angular ornament that has some lathe work, too.

 

Ron shows us how he created the pyramid shaped top-

 

 

 

@RustyFN finished up a beautiful pecan bowl. Really spectacular grain patterns-

 

 

See his post for more images

 

 

@Headhunter spent some long awaited quality time at the lathe using his Ringmaster tool. Looks like he has lost any of his skills while away! These are some real beauties!!

 

Check out more of his bowls in this post-

 

 

We've also had a couple of questions posted this week. First comes from @smitty10101. Smitty is trying to match the headstock spindle to some of his accessories. Seems like his lathe had metric threads and he needs to adapt to Imperial threads. Please check out this post and offer any suggestions for sources-

 

 

The second question came from @Jlockard1 and was posted in a thread started by @Ron Altier on stainless steel measuring cup kits. Jamie found the quality of the PSI cups less than satisfactory due to poor quality of the welds. He wondered if anyone could provide a source for a better quality kit. He explains in his post to Ron's thread-

If you know of a source, please give him a heads up.

 

 

What’s Coming Up-

If you missed Cindy's live hollowing presentation, using Lyle Jamieson's equipment, she posted it to YouTube-

 

 

From the AAW, Todd Raines will have an lesson on turning candlesticks. Looks like these will make super Christmas presents-

 

For registration-

https://community.woodturner.org/events/event-description?CalendarEventKey=4c1e49a4-b327-419c-8977-83da01e77a45&Home=%2fevents%2fmanage-events&_zs=ceDib&_zl=npbJ3

 

 

Picked this up from social media. Our very generous sponsor, Easy Wood Tools, is helping out with the Small Turning Expo!

 

Registration and more information from this link-

https://www.accelevents.com/e/mpg-small-turning-expo

 

 

For The Newbies-

Looking for some ideas for Christmas gifts? Christmas ornaments might just be the ticket!

From Alan Stratton-

 

 

Burls (burrs) can be used to create some gorgeous turnings. Mike Peace has posted a video covering some of the information to help you get started-

 

 

Picked this up from Ron Brown's Newsletter-

 

"The Divot – A Turner’s Secret Weapon

 

Def: a small dent: a small depression or hollow

 

Some things are intuitive and just obvious, but the importance of the divot was not one of them for me. I had been turning for quite a while before Chris Stott, a well-known English turner looked at me with amazement and asked, “Why don’t you leave the divot?” Chris was spending a week with me during one of his annual summer trips to America.

 

He is the author of “Turned Lidded Boxes – 50 designs”. That book became a springboard for my turning career because it laid the foundation for so many basic skills one needs as a turner. Chris is the same professional turner who asked me on the second day if we were friends yet. I said yes and he replied, “Everything you are doing is wrong!” Let’s learn the right way. And so it began.

 

Chris explained how incredibly handy leaving a divot until the last possible moment could be with all sorts of projects.

 

Bowls, plates, platters, hollow forms, etc.

When you turn the tenon on the bottom and form the outside, make a divot in the very center of the tenon and leave it there for now. During the last step, cleaning up the bottom and removing the tenon, the divot will act as an easy center-locating device.

 

No matter what device you use to grip your project for the last step, using the divot and a cone center in the tailstock will help you perfectly re-center it quickly and easily. This applies to Longworth-style chucks, doughnut chucks, friction chucks, all kinds of jamb chucks both internal and external, Cole jaws, Nova chuck jaws, and vacuum chucks.

 

Spindle turnings – turned lidded boxes, acorns, Christmas ornament globes, spheres, etc.

For spindle-turned projects that require you to turn them end-for-end to work on what was the headstock end, a divot can be incredibly useful for quickly aligning it to run concentrically when you turn it around.

 

As an example, let’s consider any small turned-lidded box project. There are two pieces to plan for: the base and the lid. Both will need to be flipped end-for-end, once to finish the inside and once to finish the outside. A divot speeds up this process immensely rather than the old turn and tap method.

 

My turning life got much less difficult when Chris taught me this simple trick. Just as a divot helps us keep our turning work centered, our faith in the One who holds our tomorrow helps keep us centered when our day-to-day world tries to get out of alignment. For that kind of divot, I use my daily guide for living. Remember that wherever you go, there you are."

 

 

 

Expand Your Horizons-

These videos are from the AAW and provide maybe a little more information than you ever wanted to know about spalting. 

 

 

 

 

New Turning Items-

Niles Bottle Stoppers has a new stopper design. These can really help focus on the stopper tops you design.

Check them out at-

https://nilesbottlestoppers.com/product/ss-7000-bottle-stopper/

 

 

Everything Else-

Rick Turns list of YouTube woodturning videos from last week-

 

 

Safe turning

 

[HandyDan]

Nice recap of the week.  More seems to be happening now that the weather is turning colder.  The cracked wood ornaments should entice us all.  Plenty of crappy wood in my neighborhood anyway.  Want to give it a try.

[Gerald]

Lots of info in this weeks post . Ready to dive into it.

[forty_caliber]

Thanks Lew!

 

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[lew]

@HandyDan Thanks! Looks like they turned out fantastic!

 

@Gerald Thank You!

 

@forty_caliber  Thanks!