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Welcome to 2025! Our Patriot Turners- @Ron Altier created an beautiful ornament from a very old piece of wood! Ron tells us about the wood and where he found it, in his post- Some how I missed posting this when it was first added. @Fred W. Hargis Jr asked us our opinion concerning a source for turning blanks. This post has had a bunch of activity. Comments, suggestions and good old fashion drooling have been taking place. Sorry, Fred, for not posting this sooner. More entries on the topic of "What's your favorite wood"- And, some comments on this post about bowl turning/sanding- We have had more activity on the "What's ON/OFF The Lathe" Thanks to @kreisdorph, @RustyFN, @Gerald and @teesquare for "What ON"- Catchup on all of the comments and posts starting here- From "OFF"- @kreisdorph, @User74 and @RustyFN Lots of comments on the one from @User74's post. He was asking if we could identify the species used for his bowl. Please check the entire post and if you recognize the species, give him a shout! What’s Coming Up- Click on the images for more information and registration. For The Newbies- A couple of videos on sharpening and using the spindle gouge- Expand Your Horizons- The first of the month and the "4 Ways" Collaboration videos have been uploaded. Always interesting how different turners approach the same project. New Turning Items- Sorry... Everything Else- From Ron Brown's newsletter: New Year’s Resolutions for Woodturners Here are some woodturner's resolutions to consider for the new year: 1. Improve Tool Sharpening Skills 2. Commit to keeping your turning tools sharp and well-maintained for smoother cuts and more precise work. 3. Experiment with New Wood Types 1. Challenge yourself to try different wood species, exploring their unique characteristics and how they behave during turning. Turn wet wood cut less than 48 hours ago. Turn a resin project. 4. Expand Techniques and Projects 5. Push your creativity by trying new techniques 1. Such as hollowing, segmented turning, or use only a skew from beginning to end. 2. Try making a bowl from a board 1. Using a band saw to cut the rings at an angle 2. Cut rings at an angle with a thin parting tool. (There is a jig for that!) 6. Organize and Clean the Workshop 1. A tidy, well-organized workspace is essential for productivity and safety. Make it a goal to clean and reorganize your tools and workspace regularly. 1. Donate unused turning tools to your turning club or give them to a buddy just starting out. 2. Saw dust can be a hazard, this is a good time to sweep it away. 7. Focus on Safety Practices 1. Always wear appropriate safety gear and continually assess your turning practices for improvements to minimize the risk of accidents. Always wear breathing protection when sanding. 2. Stand to the side when turning in case something detaches from your blank. Be out of its path. 8. Master Finishing Techniques 1. Experiment with different types of finishes, oils, film such as varnishes, lacquers, water based, etc., Pick one you haven’t used. Enhance the beauty and durability of your turned pieces. 9. Set Monthly Goals 1. Set realistic, achievable goals each month to keep you motivated, such as completing a specific project or mastering a new turning technique. 10. Join a Woodturning Community 1. Connect with other woodturners through online forums, local clubs, or workshops to share tips 2. learn new techniques, and be inspired, YouTube videos are a good source. 3. Join the AAW if you are not already a member and read their magazine cover to cover. 11. Pick a time, once a month, to have other turner(s) over for a couple of hours and share what you’ve discovered recently. 12. Document Your Work 1. Take photos of your finished pieces and document the process. This will help track your progress and create a portfolio to showcase your craftsmanship. 13. Teach or Share Your Knowledge 1. Consider teaching others the basics of woodturning or sharing your knowledge with beginners, whether through workshops, tutorials, or informal mentoring. Safe turning
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Just about 2 weeks left in our Christmas project/raffle. If you haven't donated, please consider helping us make this a wonderful Christmas for a warrior family. Our Patriot Turners- Although posted in the General Woodworking forum, this would make a great turning project as well. @Pauley created this carousel- Checkout his post and see more about this awesome project- @calabrese55 gave us a heads-up on some fantastic looking taps used to make your own thread-on glue blocks, face plates or other attachments to the lathe headstock. He posted this in the Machinery, Tools, Research, Reviews and Safety forum. Check out the post for more information and a link to the supplier Long time member @Steve Krumanaker gave us a peek at some of the "Shrooms" he has made. Along with the image, Steve let us in on why he chose this particular item- One of our "pinned" posts/topics is asking what is your favorite wood to turn. @kreisdorph add his choice to the list- Kent and @Gerald provided some tips on a post, by @Gordon who was asking for help on a bowl he was turning- Check out the additional comments. We have had a lot of great activity on the running posts of "What's ON/OFF" your lathe! From What's ON- @kreisdorph and @forty_caliber posted several items- Catch up with all the new material here- From "What's OFF"- @Gerald has been busy! The new material starts here- What’s Coming Up- Click on the images for links to more information and registration- Additional information for Exhibitions Information Session December 19, 2024 | 7 PM ET Registration for this event link- https://www.woodturner.org/Woodturner/Exhibitions/Exhibitions-Information-Session.aspx?_zs=ceDib&_zl=pOPK4 What's new in your workshop? Did you buy yourself some cool "toys" for the Holidays? Share it with all of us on Friday! Join my Sharing Session with Tod Raines, Friday, December 20th, 2:00 pm Eastern (19:00 UTC) https://www.cindydrozda.com/html/Signup.html For The Newbies- Bowls come in all sizes and shapes. Kent Weakley shares one of his favorites Expand Your Horizons- My favorite projects are ones that are utilitarian. A bowl for rice is rather specific but I found the shape/technique to be intriguing. These are some chop sticks I made a while ago- New Turning Items- These are not new, but, Carl Jacobson demonstrates how to properly install both the stainless and brass Niles inserts. Everything Else- Got the bottom of the bowl I was working on finished off. My plan was to make a Calabash bowl. Well, I succeeded in creating a round bottom but the other proportions are off. Just about every bowl I turn is done with a mortice. The mortice is fashioned into a foot. Using a tenon would definitely aid in creating a round bottom for this type of bowl. I messed up the finish at the painter's tape. Maybe I can salvage it. I want to than @RustyFN for the post he made on the AAW forum. His questions and the responses are great resources for anyone wishing to delve into the Calabash bowl and it's history- https://www.aawforum.org/community/threads/calabash-bowl.19748/
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60° this afternoon. Storm front passed over a few minutes ago, now down to 51° Our Patriot Turners- We've had a couple of entries in our "What's On Your Late" continuing post- @kreisdorph and @teesquare posted some of their work- You can catchup with all the comments and more images at @Gerald is still recovering from knee surgery but is slowly getting back into his shop. He is working to put together a JaHo jig. From the video in his post, it looks like an awesome device to add incredible embellishments to turned pieces. What’s Coming Up- Click on the images for more information and registration information- This is the video from Todd Raines (All Things Woodturning) on jam chucking that was presented live this past Friday. A little long but some interesting pointers. https://streamyard.com/watch/dRHpgGNz55hV For The Newbies- Thinking of buying a new lathe? Kent Weakley has an article on some of the things you may want to consider- https://turnawoodbowl.com/buying-a-wood-lathe-5-things-you-need-to-know/?ck_subscriber_id=1577117793 Expand Your Horizons- A week or so ago, we posted Part# 1 of a Mike Wald video "A Lidded Box an In Depth Guide". Mike has added part #2- Woodworker's Journal has published their Woodturning Monthly newsletter The entire newsletter can be read here- https://www.woodworkersjournal.com/woodturning-monthly/?utm_medium=email One of the articles is from Ernie Conover in which he turns an Hawaiian Calabash bowl- Several of our turners have made this style of bowl. The article links to an Hawaiian turner- Emiliano Achaval- and conversation about turning this style of bowl- https://www.woodworkersjournal.com/video-emiliano-achaval/ New Turning Items- "Nothing to see here, move along" Everything Else- I have never been very skilled at creating pleasant looking designs/forms/proportions. Every now and then something turns out OK but usually it's pretty neanderthal and my hollowing is mostly confined to bowls. There was some of that wind shake cherry left, so I decided to play a little. I have a set of Easy Wood Tools Mini Hollowers as well as a set of mid-sized hollowers. Used some of each to make these. I think the one on the right should have had a smaller diameter "neck". I didn't make any real effort to finish them- just some sanding. Safe turning jhdgfj
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Next time, @Gerald, give us a heads up and we will stuff the ballot box! https://www.aawforum.org/community/threads/august-2023-turning-challenge-final-results.21511/
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Back from the beach. For those who can relate: Wife and Dog necessities- Navy veteran- Our Patriot Turners- @forty_caliber has been working on some calabash bowls- Love the grain in this one. And another one- Forty also showed us a gorgeous shaving brush turning- @Headhunter posted some more of his beautiful segmented turnings in our Ringmaster subforum- Check out his post for more examples! We've had some more comments in our on-going thread "What's On Your Lathe" and @Gerald posted his cool Dice Cups! I'm gonna have to have him teach me how he gets those spirals/cross hatches so evenly spaced! What’s Coming Up- The AAW symposium starts tomorrow! Check our post from 2 weeks ago for the Virtual Signup. Also, you can see some of the goings-on from Lyle Jamieson (and Mike OB), Joe Fleming, and Cindy Drozda. They will be live at the AAW Trade Show. Tod Raines and Steve Worcester will be at their shops in Texas. They'll all be on the Vendor Showcase Live Stream!! Don't miss it! Friday, June 2nd, 3:30 pm Eastern (19:30 UTC). It's FREE! https://streamyard.com/watch/HPPX7NfwzCzN?fbclid=IwAR1Uyxj3nbHf-v1JR55ZeXuu8ugsGIfV6a8LrVlA4Qd0oa2sZtnE-G7jN4w https://www.youtube.com/@Lyle/streams For The Newbies- Keeping the Morris taper, on your lathe, clean will assure a solid grip. You can purchase a cleaning tool or make one. Jim Rodgers shows us how- Do you use paper towels to apply finish? Tired of cutting them into little square pads? Mike Peace has a solution- Baby rattles are fun to make. This video from Craft Supplies USA gives us step by step instructions and several ideas on different shapes- Expand Your Horizons- In our last post, we listed several videos on making kitchen utensils. Richard Raffan demonstrates how to turn a spatula using my old nemesis, the skew! Mike Waldt turns a beautiful cherry goblet from a log- New Turning Items- Our last post had a review, by Mike Waldt, on the Woodcut Max 4. This is a follow up and Mike answers some questions about the product. Another coring product from Hunter. The Hunter Korpro Cartridge that retrofits onto the existing OneWay™ coring system. https://huntertoolsystems.com/product/coring-cartridge/ This vide, from Mike Peace, shows it in action- The Vendor's Showcase, listed above, may reveal some new items. Check it out! Everything Else- No shop time for me. still trying to catch up with all of the phone message requests while we were away.
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7x4 pecan calabash. Kiln dried, finished with Ack's and DO. .40
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10x5 pecan calabash. Tried a new foot design on this one. Let me know what you think. .40
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10x5 Spalted Pecan Calabash. Rough turned and dried in kiln to <10% moisture content. This particular piece of wood earned the title of pecan-crete. Very hard and subject to end grain tear-out. Approached finished size with oversize NR scraper. Slow and steady got-r-done. Finished with Ack's pastes and Danish Oil. .40
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Our annual Operation Ward 57 is underway! Please checkout this post for more information on our selected family. Our Patriot Turners- @forty_caliber turned another bowl from Pecan. That species sure does have some beautiful grain and color. Please hop on over to his post and see some of the great comments from our members- New member @Bill Blasic commented on one of our older "Tip" entries on the woodworm screw. He made some great points in his post. Please check this out and give him a warm welcome to our forum- @HandyDan found some inspiration from last weeks "Wednesday's..." and turned some sweet little projects- Dan offers more information in his post- Sorry, Dan, I looked all over the place and couldn't come up with the wine glass turning. What’s Coming Up- Check this out for tomorrow, Thursday November 10, from Cindy Drozda. A live tool talk on using the camera for hollowing. Our own @Steve Krumanaker has been using his camera to do hollowing for quite some time. For The Newbies- Another presentation from Cindy on creating the 40/40 Bowl Gouge grind. Some great lighting tips from "Robo Hippy" Rolling pins are easy to turn and make excellent presents. Nice article, with tutorial, from the Family Handyman. It also features the use of Easy Wood Tools for turning. https://www.familyhandyman.com/project/wood-turn-a-rolling-pin/ Expand Your Horizons- Want to give a big shoutout and THANKS to @forty_caliber for the heads-up on this video on creating eggs. Using the Skew has always been my downfall but this turner makes it look so easy. Sam Angelo demonstrates creating a basic basket illusion Carl Jacobson turns an absolutely gorgeous pedestal vase. Lots of turning and some carving- Master Woodturner Kirk DeHeer takes you step-by-step through the process of creating a Calabash Bowl in this video from Craft Supplies USA- New Turning Items- OK, not a tool but a useful resource that I recently discovered. From StarBond Adhesives- Starbond_eMagazine_Oct_2022_E1.pdf The link to the source-- https://starbond.com/blogs/tutorials Everything Else- Rick Turns list of YouTube woodturning videos from last week- Been hectic around here but the 2 little walnut bowls reached moisture equilibrium and have moved to the lathe. We are supposed to get some rainy weather on Friday so maybe I'll get a chance to finish them- Safe turning
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For everyone who got to know Jim Luley, from Easy Wood Tools, he posted this message to all our turners- Please drop by his post and wish him well. As @Steve Krumanaker said on another site, "he's the nicest friend I never met". Our Patriot Turners- @RustyFN posted a gorgeous cherry bowl he has finished- Rusty tells us a little about the shape and finish in this post- In addition, Rusty is tackling a large walnut bowl! Can't wait to see how this one comes out- Rusty also asked us what type of sanding discs we used. Several of our members offered what they prefer. How about giving Rusty your opinion- @HandyDan got a really good jump on his Christmas ornaments- Check out his post for more images and what he used to create the colored stripes- What’s Coming Up- Click on the images for links to more information and registration. For The Newbies- Handy Dan gave us a look at his batch of Christmas ornaments. Here's a video from Rick Turns demonstrating how to turn another type- Mike Peace posted an video explaining why considering grain direction is important when making a turning. Thinking about learning bowl turning? Watch Richard Raffan turn one from start to finish. Lots of great details. Expand Your Horizons- @RustyFN showed us his rounded bottom bowl. Here's Lyle Jamieson demonstrating turning a similar bowl with a natural edge. Turning a bowl from wet/green wood is mostly a two step process. Rough turn and then allowing the moisture to equalize before finishing. Here is Sam Angelo's process- Last week we mentioned a method of sealing bowls/vessels using milk. This is an update from Debbie Coull Experiment in sealing wood with milk update: IT WORKED !!!! Woohoooooo! The wood surface has a waxy feel. Smooth. Absolutely no odour. The wood was sycamore, but I doubt it matters. Stone age man would have used whatever was the local wood. I will now use this daily and plan to make more. Maybe a cup to see if it adversely flavours tea, but I doubt it. The method the worked was I submerged in milk and simmered for 2 hours, then left in the milk overnight. I used semi skimmed, but I doubt that matters as it's the milk protein (casein) that seals the wood. The next day i rinsed with fresh water and left to dry. It was incredibly heavy now, having almost doubled it's original weight. I left it to dry for a few days. Here is the porridge test (scientific test used by bears). Perhaps others could maybe use this for their food bowls. I'm really pleased this worked, and I would have persevered until I figured it out. Ancient techniques may be lost in time - but they definitely have their merits. For the Instagram Post- https://www.instagram.com/p/CkGFH0-jNhx/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY%3D For Facebook- https://m.facebook.com/groups/229189982049033/permalink/662821255352568/ New Turning Items- More on the Yorkshire grit sanding paste from Easy Wood Tools- Turning a natural edge bowl- like the one shown by Lyle Jamieson, has special challenges. Some reverse chucking methods could damage the fragile natural edge. Ron Brown has a solution. Check out his site at- https://www.ronbrownsbest.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=47&product_id=865 Everything Else- Rick Turns list of YouTube woodturning videos from last week- Safe turning
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Last day of August! Where did the summer go?!?!? Our Patriot Turners- Our turners have been busy this week! @Gerald posted about a novel idea for embellishing a turning. He describes the materials he used and how he obtained the neat colorization in his post- @Gunny posted this in the "What's on tour weekend agenda"- Gunny has these down to an art! @forty_caliber finished up a bowl he started a while back. The grain and color in this one is incredible! He explains the name in his post- @RustyFN posted his beautiful Calabash bowl. He received lots of positive comments and @Gerald was kind enough to post a couple of his bowls for comparison. What’s Coming Up- Hold onto your hats- lots coming up in the near future! A bunch from the AAW. Click on the images for links and information. For The Newbies- Jim Rodgers continues his instruction on how/why catches happen. In this one, Jim discusses the scraper- Expand Your Horizons- Mike Waldt turns and embellishes an ash hollow form- ...and a Yew lidded box Seems we have been really concentrating on making scoops. Another idea but quite different than the previous designs- New Turning Items- SWAT was this past weekend. Cindy Drozda took the opportunity to video many of the vendors and their products. She was live on several occasions. She has posted some of the material on her YouTube Channel. The link to her channel- https://www.youtube.com/user/cindydrozda Craft Supplies USA is having a closeout on a bunch of their products. Some good prices! https://www.woodturnerscatalog.com/Sales/20/Closeout?utm_source=csusa&utm_medium=email&utm_content=closeout&utm_campaign=22-08-closeout Woodturners Wonders Weekly sale: https://woodturnerswonders.com/collections/weekly-sale A couple of weeks ago we mentioned the 3M Xtract sand paper. Taylor Toolworks is currently having a sale on the product- https://taytools.com/collections/3m-xtract?afmc=17p&utm_campaign=17p&utm_source=leaddyno&utm_medium=affiliate Everything Else- Rick Morris must be on vacation this week- He didn't post his usual list of turning videos. Tim Yoder is always a lot of fun to watch- I've been kicking this idea around for a while. Usually, when I make a lidded container, I will use contrasting species for the lid and body. Some things like pepper mills are made from a single piece of the same species. Cutting the blank in half and then creating a tenon can cause a noticeable grain mismatch where the cut/tenon is created. I was watching one of Cindy Drozda's live tool talks and she described a technique that minimizes the material loss and grain mismatch. After cutting the blank, it is glued back together with a sacrificial piece between the halves. This sacrificial piece becomes the tenon. My first attempt at this was a miserable failure. The cuts were not clean enough to create a good glue joint. I'm thinking I need a way to ensure the pieces will look seamless when mated together. My next try was a little better. The first thing was to create a sharp cut with no tear out. I forgot to take a picture in my haste but I used a skew chisel to start the separation cut. Then used my freshly sharpened, shop made, thin parting tool. Also cranked the lathe speed way up to part off the pieces- I did not create a tenon. Instead, I decided to turn tight fitting plug that would be used as the lid tenon. Mortice in one end- Fitting the plug Glue the plug into one of the mortices- the lid on this one. Trim the plug so the two halves fit together- Carefully hollow out the insides making certain not to touch the plug mating surfaces. I did not spend a lot of time sanding the inside. My main goal was to see if the plug idea would work. Some sanding on the outside and testing the grain match- Had to play a little to fancy up the very plain shape- I think this will have a much great effect when used on highly figured wood. This was from a very old piece of air dried walnut. Quite brittle. Safe turning
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Making my first calabash bowl. Still have sanding and finish to do.
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