HWA June 1st – Fancy Turning with David Springett

Last Monday I went to this month’s wood turning group. For the first time in ages I didn’t have anything to show for my own activities. In my defense it was only 2 weeks since the May meeting which had to be moved due to the bank holidays.
And in that two weeks I got my eyes lasered, so I was not allowed in my workshop.

But there was still plenty to learn, and I got a lot out of the evening. This months demonstration was by professional turner David Springett. He is author of a bunch of books about wood turning. And he also brought a long a lot of examples of his work.

What is great about David’s work is that it all looks insanely complicated. And it is far from standard fare of bowls and vases. He claimed that most of what he makes is actually fairly easy, but is make to *look* complicated. Well he succeeded there because most of the stuff on display was daunting to contemplate.

It was truely inspiring to see a whole world of new opportunities in turning. If you ever thought you were running out of ideas for what you can turn then check out his work. He confessed that he has more ideas than time to attempt them.

Another great thing about his work is that there is a lot of logic, maths and science behind it. The scientist in me appreciates the logical progression he took us through with streptohedrons. These are shapes that he turns to have a cross section which is a regular geometric shape with rotation symmetry. In it’s simplest form a cone turned to have a cross section of an equilateral triangle. Once turned the shape is split in half and one side is rotated in relation to the other and stuck back together. This makes some fascinating shapes, and in theory, the turning involves is relatively simply ‘joint the dots’ If you do the maths correctly you just mark out your shape, turn to the right diameter, then turn straight lines between points. And your done. Of course I suspect this is easier to say than to do. But I can’t wait to have a go. The simple progression is simply that if you can figure out how to turn a shape that will have a cross section with rotational symmetry then you will get another interesting shape. Cones have triangle cross sections. Making something with a pentagon cross section, or even a hexagon cross section isn’t that hard.
He went on to show items with ’star’ cross sections, 3 pointed, 5 pointed, 6 pointed etc. Harder to turn, but these create spirals when one half is twisted. Suddenly relatively simple shapes are really producing complex looking objects. Really cool stuff.

Another incredible thing he showed us was a wooden arrow through a hollow glass apple. He had another example through a wine bottle. Why so incredible? Well the arrow is a single solid piece of wood. With flights at one side, and an arrow head at the other. Each too large to fit through the holes the arrow passes through. If it had not been explained to us, I would of convinced myself that somewhere there was a break and glue that I just couldn’t see.

But the truth is more incredible, and again inspiring as to what can be done with the application of science. I am no less impressed for knowing how it is done. This item only works with certain kinds of wood. You need wood that has thick summer growth and thin winter growth, which amounts to widely spaced rings. You also have to allow the arrow such that the arrow head has parallel nearly straight lines of grain running through it. Such that head on looking down the shaft the lines right horizontal.
That’s a pretty specific setup, but I was still not ready for the next bit…
You take the arrow head and boil it for 15 minutes. *Then* you put the arrow head in a vice and slowly but firmly squeeze it until it is flat with the shaft of the arrow. And leave it for 3 days…

Who figured this out?!

After 3 days, remove the arrow from the clamp, and pass it through the holes of your glass form.
And now the amazing part…you stick the arrow head back in hot water and magically it expands back to shape.

I kid you not. I saw it, with my own eyes. Yes the wood looks a little different after this process, but over time it dries again and I would never have guessed that this would work.

This really blew me away, again opening a whole world of possibilities that simply would never have occurred to me.

This is why I go to a woodturning club. To have my eyes opened to amazing ideas that I would stand no chance of coming up with on my own.
This one meeting was easily worth my 20 quid subscription fee (which covers me for a year) Add to that I am apparently the luckiest person ever and appear to win something in the raffle every month.
I promise I only buy into the raffle to support the club. I always buy 5 lines. I am more than happy to ‘pay’ 5 pounds per meeting.
However I can’t remember the last meeting where I did not win something at least equal to my 5 pound cost. This month I won a bead forming tool. Last month it was a block of sycamore. At the rate I’m going I feel slightly bad that I’m practically making a profit from going

In the background I’ve been attempting to help the club with it’s website. Or rather I’ve been pushing them towards using a wordpress blog to run it instead of the existing hosting. The existing site is a bit of a pain to manage, and I think life will be easier with a wordpress based on. To that end I’ve created http://hantswoodturners.wordpress.com and I’ve started putting content on there, including a bunch of pictures I took this month of David Springett’s talk this month.

We’re not quite switched yet, though I think we are going that way. I hope that in future I will be able to give a little back to my club through helping out with content for the site, and maybe even attracting some new members. If your a woodturner in hampshire, you should deffinately be in a club. If you’re even slightly interested in woodwork but have never tried turning, you should come along and see what all the fuss is about.

HWA January meeting – Adrian Smith off-centre turning

A new year and already we’ve had the first good woodturning demonstration. This month Adrian Smith gave the demo
on off-centre turning.
There are a few signs which indicate someone takes woodturning seriously, one such sign was present on Adrian Smith… his own work smock with his name stitched on breast.

He started off by giving a top tip on making and expansion chuck for holding rings or any piece with a whole all the way through. Of course his examples were all off centre. Simply turn down a cylinder to the hole size, the cut down the middle on a bandsaw (not all the way). Then you can slide your piece onto the spiggot, and when you bring up the tailstock for support, the point will push apart the two sides thus providing an expansion and more grip.
This should be enough grip to even turn off centre.

Another idea he showed was a metal plate with single piece at right angles welded to the back. That can be gripped between two bits of a 4 jaw chuck. Hot glue gun your wood onto the faceplate. Then you can slide and adjust the panel in the chuck to adjust the off-centre amount.

Then he moved onto the first demo… making a paper knife, notable because one of the first demos I saw at the club was a paper knife. Adrian said he saw that demo and thought ‘I wouldn’t do it like that‘
Cut tenon on end that can be gripped in chuck between two jaws of the 4 jaw chuck. The other end can be supported by tailstock. You can line up tenon with edges of jaw to get centre. Then you can slide the tenon to change the centre. This is way simpler than the technique shown before. The main thing is that the previous technique scaled to production turning 4 at once. But this way is much easier for a single piece.

Pre push tail stock into each of the end centres before you cut away removing the support otherwise the pressure will just bend the wood and risk breaking away.

Divide the wood into squares running down its length to help guide the consistent of centering both ways.

Turn off centre one way moving the tenon to a mark and tail stock across the same amount. Then shift to the other side. To achieve the blade. Obviously turn down closer to middle as you go down the ‘blade’ length.
Another tip for demoing…When you have catch don’t stop to see it…turn it away then stop..

Once the blad is turned both sides shift back to centre to turn the handle.
Could be sanded on the lathe but just finished by hand often

Next project..

Making a fancy candlestick with off-centre turned discs down the stem.
Big ish cylinder/cone tapering to tailstock. With long spiggot on end so that it’s still in jaws when off’ centre Taking away material as much as poss to reduce weight whilst off-centre

Make a mark on wood and tape on chuck to allow setting back to this point. E.g. since it can get rotated when you switch centres, it helps to keep alignment.

Time for another tip.. .candle wax on the tool rest to aid even movement of the tool which helps for an even cut.

Draw a straight line across centre line on tail end.
Whilst spinning draw circles on end at intervals out. The point where the circle intersects with the straight line is even off-centre to each side. The various circles provide different amount of off centre.
Long’n’strong bowl gouge for cutting. Short grind on it. Wouldn’t use a spindle gouge on it.
Marked heavy lines down the length to show the different points to cut.
Set to first off centre point then straight V cut into the area turn until you turning all the way round but not so far that it drops off
Once done, move to another centre. If you follow a spiral path of centres you’ll get a spiral of off centres.
If you jump back and forth you’ll get a more haphazard arrangement.
You can turn such that you have 4 sections. 1,3 the same centre and 2,4 the same. Don’t need to sand finish the first until you’ve done the second at the same centre.
Once you’ve done a couple don’t tighten the tail stock too far..else you’ll snap off the end…since there is now not wood all the way between tailstock and head stock.
Another tip.. Sliding chisel back off a surface to feel where it starts to come back on. Can be easier than spotting by eye where the edge is.
Re-centre to do base and top dome. Shape the top size appropriate to candle type. Obviously a tea light needs more space. Better to face off the top before drilling. The drill bit needs to touch evenly to avoid stresses on the weakened frame.
Put brass or some candle fitment on top.

Demo 3 Turning a cube to an interesting bowl.

Close 4 jaw chuck up leaving small hole in middle, put corner of cube in hole. Put opposite corner in appropriate live centre..hollow centre for auger.
Cut spiggot on one end..will be the base.
If you catch too hard it will just stop as the friction is reasonably low.
Then turn around onto spiggot… you need to cut the spiggot relatively far in to get reasonable diameter to hold.
Now the opposite point is in live centre
round over the base down to chuck leaving square top.
Then remove tail so you can hollow out
don’t do the stem too thin. The grain is not running lenthwise so it will be liabe to snap.
Obviously as you hollow you’re creating three ‘wings’ the tips of which where the edges of the cube and the dips are the centre of the sides of cube.

Next tip.. When hollowing, don’t bother turning all the way to centre…leave small stub and cut under occasionally to let it drop away.
Superglue the edges to give rigidity to help get thin without break out.
Sand flat surfaces with sandpaper on block to keep them flat.
Used a ring tool to finish the hollowing

All in all another great and informative evening. Learned lots and picked up some good tips and techniques. My bowl gouge usage had been all wrong, just watching it done right helps a lot.
Harry was ill and unable to make it so I couldn’t get his opinion on my turning efforts, but Bill was on hand to set me a challenge for next month…a wine bottle coaster.

Since the last meeting I had a go at a letter opener. I made mine too short, but I was pleased with how the technique worked and I think next time I can get the proportions right.