Saturday 5 March 2011

A huge ‘shroom

This evening whilst the family were watching Rocky 5 I escaped to the workshop again and had a go with a large lump of wood. Actually today is my day for large lumps as earlier I made a bowl on the outboard side, and this evening I loaded up the following monster…

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It’s about 2’6” long and 8” or so in diameter. It was so large the banjo couldn’t traverse beneath it until I’d turned the outside off, so I progressed from right to left as can be seen in the above in order to turn it.

The wood had only been felled about a month ago, and I couldn’t believe the amount of water coming off it – I was getting soaked. As I’m sure this will crack badly I made the only thing I could with it…

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That’s one for up at the allotment I think!

Turning on the large faceplate

I had a fair bit of spare time today so decided it was off to the workshop for me and one of the things I wanted to do was give the large faceplate a go.

I loaded up a large lump of Oak and off I went…

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I haven’t yet finished painting the outboard part of the lathe (nor the lathe body itself, I’m having too much fun using it!). And I only have one tool rest which whilst easy to use isn’t cranked to getting close to the wood is a bit tricky (I can sense a purchase coming on soon!).

Anyhow I gingerly turned on the lathe at its slowest speed and started turning. A while later I was at the following stage – with some beautiful figuring in the wood…

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I then went on to the inside of the bowl and the semi-finished article is below.

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I’ll now leave it to season on the shelf and see what it’s like in a few months. There’s a bit of a hole internally but that all adds to the character. I just hope it doesn’t split whilst drying out.

A salad bowl

I’ve made a small salad bowl this week for a friend at work – but can’t give it to her yet as I haven’t sealed it. I went to Axminster tools recently (the one near High Wycombe) and bought some sealant in a starter pack. Or at least I think I did. Try as I might I can’t find it anywhere, either at home or in the workshop.

So the bowl will just have to languish here a little longer…

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It’s made of an 8” disk of Elm which I found quite hard to turn. I did a piece of Hornbeam a few days ago (sorry, forgot the pictures) and that was gorgeous to turn – I’ll be ordering some more from Stiles & Bates soon.

I’m off down to Reading for a couple of days this coming week so will hopefully have time to pop into Axminster and buy something to finish this with then.