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19th May 2018 Evening Demo – John Aitken

This month Blackcountry Woodturners were graced with the presence of professional woodturner John Aitkin, otherwise known as “The bowler-hatted turner”, renowned for wearing a bowler hat when woodturning at craft shows, his theory is that “people cannot remember names but they never forget a hat!”

John’s evening consisted of detailed examination, super explanation, fine tool control and tuition surrounding project enhancement, by the inclusion of thread chasing, and forming various “finishing finials” made in, wood, Pewter, Deer Antler and Imitation Ivory to enrich the final project.

John explained that these techniques and materials could be considered for any type of project, but to give early thought to the design and how the inclusions would be used to enhance the piece and not just doing for doing’s sake…..good advice..

John based his whole demonstration around the making of one of his signature projects a decorative three-piece needle box, utilising all the stated techniques.

John went to great lengths to demonstrate and educate us about the art of thread chasing and showed his skill of thread chasing in both wood and pewter.

For the final part of his demonstration, John spoke about “Sharp Cutting edges” and showed to the audience his method of taking a sharp edge to a razor-sharp edge by using a simple grind wheel modified to run backward by reversing the guard plates, then replacing the stone grind wheels with sisal and brushed cotton wheels turning the equipment into a highly efficient edge polishing machine.

John’s character, humor, and sheer enjoyment of demonstrating his skills was evident to all in attendance making it a truly enjoyable experience for all. We hope we can persuade him to return next year to educate us more in the arts of woodturning.

Members also contributed to the evening by bringing in and presenting a good selection of crafts

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February meeting

Our February meeting was a demonstration by Paul Hannaby, who was recently appointed chairman of the AWGB. He has demonstrated at the club before, a goblet with a barley twist stem, if memory serves. This time around his focus was on bowl turning.

We held the demo meeting in the room adjoining our normal meeting room, for a number of reasons. For one, it offers a big overhead screen which we could connect to our camera, and thus provide a much improved view for the audience. And I am pleased to report that we had a very full turnout of members. Another reason is that the layout of our normal meeting room is much better suited for hands-on days than demonstrations, since it has a massive staircase right in the middle of the room.

For his first bowl, Paul chose a piece of mahogany of about 8″ diameter. This was mounted onto a screw chuck. This mounting method, which works fine for bowls up to about 10″ diameter, has the advantage of giving unfettered access to the bottom of the bowl, so that a nice foot can be formed with push cuts, which leave a much better surface than pull cuts. Paul talked extensively about his choice of bowl gouges, which are in essence all standard grind, i.e. very little wing. For the finishing cuts he used a particularly heavy bowl gouge, showing us that the weight reduced any bouncing dramatically and the long inside curve creates such a nice slicing action that the finish turned bowl hardly needed any sanding at all. He also demonstrated how to use a stick of hot-melt glue to check the surface for any bumps.

His second bowl was to be a natural edge piece. The approach is pretty much the same: start on the screw chuck, finish turn the outside (and sand and decorate if desired/required), then turn around and form the inside of the bowl. Obviously the challenge with a natural edge bowl is always to get the first one or two inches of the cut done without losing the bark or any other accidents. A steady hand and a good eye for the ghosted edge of the workpiece is required for this.

A very pleasant surprise of the evening was the table showing the work members had brought in. A wide variety of items and, it must be said, all of good standard. Clearly our members are feeling fired up to get into their workshops and make things. Excellent all around. Here are some images.

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BCWT –Demonstrator Training Day

On Saturday 27th January 2018, Black Country Woodturners completed its first AWGB Demonstrator training event held at the home and workshop of club member Wolfgang…..,

Four club members in total on the day being Wolfgang…….Roger Cheshire, Bob Mercer & Ian Brown

The event is all part of the facilities provided by the Association of Woodturners of Great Britain (A.W.G.B) and is open to all associated clubs and members around the country

We were honoured with our hosts Peter Bradwick, AWGB Development and Training officer, and Paul Hannaby professional turner and AWGB Web Master & Data manager. Together they provided a very full, information packed, and fun day.

The morning consisted of the educational training inputs detailing the methodology, planning, thought processes and preparation surrounding the delivery of a demonstrator presentation based at club level.

One of the morning exercises was for all the students to give a five minute talk on any subject of their choosing, topics ranged from Mad cows disease, Retirement, Workshops  & Wolfgang’s adventures around the world.

After lunch the afternoon session was taken up with Roger, Bob, Ian & Wolfgang presenting their 20 minute woodturning demonstration, carefully watched over by Peter & Paul.

Bob made a Honey Dipper, Ian showed the process of “Woggle” making, Roger made “The Magic Gene Bottle” and Wolfgang made a “Garden Dibber” using a “Skew” chisel.  All went down well with good constructive feedback and encouraging comments from our mentors Peter & Paul.

The whole day was rounded off with a good debrief and social chat before all setting off for home,  a good day was had by all with plenty of learning, fun, and tea drinking.

Black Country Woodturners would like to express our thanks to Peter and Paul for putting on a very enjoyable and informative day, and to Wolfgang allowing us into his home and workshop for the event to take place.

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St Pauls Brownie & Guide Demo Evening -Thursday 1st February 2018.

On Thursday 1st February 2018, Black Country Woodturners, in conjunction with 3rd Blackheath St Pauls Brownie & Guide leaders put on a “Woggle” making evening for the girls aged between 7 – 16yrs.

Several weeks of planning and preparation went into event working with the Brownie & Guide leaders in advance to provide a creative evening for the girls to enjoy.

The idea being for each member of the Brownie & Guide pack, including leaders to choose a woggle from a number of  pre made styles then decorate and finish the item, leaving the event with their creative work.

The evening entailed a quick introductory talk to the Brownie’s and Guide’s about woodturning, followed by a live demonstration of a woggle being turned.

All the girls chose their woggle styles then went off to colour and decorate; having finished the decoration, the woggles were then finished off with sanding sealer and wax top coat.

All the Girls had a great time throughout the evening with many unique designs being achieved by all age groups….. here are just a few of the colorful designs below…

Feedback from leaders and the parents of the girls has been very positive with everyone enjoying the evening.

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January meeting

The club meeting on the 18th of January was our first proper demo at the new venue at Broadway in Dudley. It features a short turning demonstration by Melvyn Adams and a much more lengthy demonstration of pyrography by his wife.

In fact, several friends of hers had brought in their pyrography machines, and the whole thing developed almost into a hands-on evening. Advice was freely given and the usage of various different tips, templates, patterns, and what not was shown (and tried by club members).

We even had a fan operating to extract any fumes into the outside air.

Wouldn’t want to trigger the fire alarm on a club night, would we now?

As you can see from these two pictures, there was strong interest, and several club members made little keyring tabs or similar items.

In the evening we had the highest attendance figure ever for a club meeting, with 36 people in the room, of which 31 were club members. We signed up a few new members and some others showed interest.

This is an ongoing positive trend: our membership has increased by about 50% over the last 2 years, which makes it easier for the committee (and therefore the entire club) to manage finances, and provide new and improved tools and demos. This positive trend was also shown in the number of items on the display table.

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Ashwood Nursery Open Day

As usual for the club, we had a stall at the open day of the Ashwood Nursery just down the road from Wall Heath. This event usually attracts a good crowd, and this year was no exception. There were a few differences to previous years, though: After some initial heavy rain we had a dry day (hooray) and there were no midgets (hooray) and the club had a much bigger stall, consisting of two conjoined tents.

About half a dozen club members enjoyed a day out, with demonstrations to the public, who in turn showed good interest. The club managed to take about £140, and as usual half of that goes back to the charity chosen by Ashwood, and the other half gets donated to the charity chosen by the club. Here are a few pictures from the day:

Club members Paul and Ron watching the public taking keen interest.

Sometimes there was almost a queue to get to the front!

One of our club members with his display.

And this is the display of another club member.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two club members manning the charity table.

And here the chairman himself demonstrates woodturning.

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Mark Taylor Demo

Following on from the previous demo, where there was a mixup in dates between us and the demonstrator, this time around it was like fate itself had intervened: our demonstrator was struck down by illness.

Fortunately for us, this time we had a little advance warning, and our chairman and the event organizer managed to find a replacement, Mark Taylor. A few years ago, Mark hung up his salesman suit and started working full time on his piece of woodland, and on that evening he came to us with his pole lathe and shave horse, to demonstrate how these are used.

Mark clearly is a very happy man, despite his clear knowledge and acceptance that on his own he would struggle to make a living. As far as he is concerned, though, spending all day every day in the woods more than makes up for all the financial deprivations.

His woodland consists mainly of ashes and rowans, with some other typical local species thrown in as well. He had brought some typical items to the demo, hand-carved spoons, and bowls, but mostly spindle work. His demonstration was a glimpse into what a typical bodger would have done: set up a camp in the woods, assemble a shave horse and a pole lathe (often only bringing along the metal parts and making the rest up from wood cut on site), and then producing hundreds and hundreds of “bodged” spindles, mostly for chairs and tables and the likes.

He started out with an ash log, about 2 feet long and 5″ diameter, and used a special wedge to split it twice down the middle to get 4 quadrants of roughly equal size. One of these was then held on the shave horse and Mark used a drawknife to quickly rough it into shape.

This piece was then mounted between centers on the pole lathe and then turned into a chair spindle with the same tools one would use on a powered lathe: a spindle roughing gouge, spindle gouge, and skew chisel.

The main differences are that firstly the bodger has to power his own lathe by constantly pumping a large pedal on the floor, which is connected at the back to a rope. This rope is wound once or twice around the workpiece and its other end is attached to a rubber cord mounted between two flexible poles. Between the poles and the rubber, this provides the energy store that pulls the floor pedal back up, thus allowing the turner to initiate the next pump action.

Secondly, actual turning can only happen during the down stroke. In consequence, very good tool control is required to get a decent surface.

Thirdly, the actual turning speed is low compared to motorized lathes, maybe 200rpm or slightly more. Again, this requires good tool control and some patience.

Mark clearly knows what he’s doing, as the finish on his items was nearly flawless. He also demonstrated some bowl turning on the lathe, which is generally done with hook tools and on-end grain. This generally involves a cone in the center remaining in the bowl, so that it can be held on the lathe (there is no such thing as a scroll chuck on a pole lathe), which is then whittled down to a small diameter once the rest of the bowl is finished, and finally removed with a sharp tool when the bowl is taken off the lathe.

All in all, it is a very entertaining and instructive, some might even say inspirational, demonstration.

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February meeting

Our meet in February was a hands-on day, with 2 lathes in operation and 2 grinding stations. On one lathe, Mick Littlehales demonstrated turning a chunky bowl/dish from a piece of ash, with a mortice (to hold the piece on the chuck in expansion mode) and a variety of decorations around the rim. The other lathe was used by our chairmain, Roger, to give some newcomers a first chance to try their hand with a roughing gouge, bowl gouge and spindle gouge.

One of the sharpening stations was operated by Wolfgang, helping a few members getting their tools back into shape. And, of course, we also had a display table with quite a nice array of turned items.

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January demo: Robert Till

In January, we had Robert as our demonstrator. He greets from Stafford and has been turning wood for a long time. His demo focused primarily on birds houses and bird feeders, both items that generally sell well at craft fairs, are fun to make for both the experienced and the less experienced, and do not require expensive materials or special tools.

Here’s the man himself:

The typical bird house can be made from many different types of wood, for this evening he had brought along some pieces of part seasoned sycamore, some with a little bit of spalting starting to develop, and in various stages of progress. The main body is about 4-5″ diameter and about 9″ tall (obviously this can be adjusted to available timber within reason), and a second piece is required for the lid, approx 1″ wider in diameter and 3.5″ tall. Depending on the method chosen for mounting the pieces, extra timber needs to be added to the length to account for tenons.

Robert started out with a piece that had been turned into a round cylinder, but nothing else. He put it between centres, skimmed it to ensure roundness and turned a tenon on one end, so he could it in the chuck. Once mounted in the chuck, a hole was drilled down the centre to approx. the depth required, and he started hollowing the cylinder, always taking time to explain the various cuts and tools used.

Since hollowing is not the most attractive work to demonstrate, this item was then swapped out for one that had been hollowed already. Robert made it very clear that the only chance of success with partly seasoned wood is by keeping the wall thickness even from the top right down to the bottom, otherwise one should expect cracks to develop during the final drying. He then turned a shoulder into the top of the bird house body, where the wall thickness is reduced from 6mm to 3mm, and finally proceeded to turn the foot of the body, where it gradually tapers into a point. A very important bit is the drain hole at the bottom, about 5mm in diameter, which ensures that any moisture can escape safely.

Robert did not do any sanding during the demo, but mentioned that the finish on these bird houses is very much left to the individual maker, but one should seek advice about suitable finishes from relevant organisations (clearly some lacquers or oils would be at the least an irritant to the future occupiers and at the worst a health hazard). The entry hols for the birds should be positioned at least 120mm above the foot (apparently that’s a safe distance where cats cannot reach inside), and its diameter has an influence on which birds can enter.

The lid was turned in similar fashion, with a lip protruding into the shoulder in the bottom part. This is where the two are eventually joined together with a few screws. Again, wall thickness has to be even to prevent cracking, and decoration is left to the individual.

Towards the end of the evening, a little bit of time was left, which was used to make a bird feeder to go along with the bird house. Made from a similar size piece of timber, the bird feeder has a domed roof, rounded bottom and a recess for the feed. Turning the recess is initially done with a standard spindle gouge, but in order to achieve substantial depth the use of a hollowing tools is required.

And finally a few pictures showing some more of Robert’s work:

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October meeting: demo by Bob Mercer

Bob gave a really interesting and entertaining  series of short demonstrations.

The first demo was of a pewter turned pen, sorry no photo, which Bob turned using his own hand made pewter blanks mounted on a pen mandrel. Bob made the blanks by drilling a 12mm hole in a piece of dry wood 50mm deep and filling with molten pewter. He then drilled the blank and inserted a brass sleeve. Bob took time to explain the whole process to club members and answered numerous questions from those present. He also explained the need for a thorough sanding regime from 240 to 12000 grit and even using a metal polish to give the mirror finish he achieved. A really excellent demo.

Bob also demonstrated a slightly different way to finish off a 5” oak hand mirror.

During the evening he showed club members what can be done with what would be sometimes be classed as pieces of scrap wood. Bob made a standard bottle stopper then he turned a novelty off centre “ducks bottom” bottle stopper.

In a previous demo Bob was unable to finish a pendant due to a missing jig so he decided to finally complete that project in purple heart wood, and there was even time for an oak light pull.

Throughout the evening Bob gave members tips and advice on the use of tools and materials and the best sources for pen blanks etc.

Bob keep us all entertained with his story of building a coracle a few years back and the oak seat he had used for it, had been recycled, and part of that seat was now the 5” hand mirror he had turned earlier.

Bob delivered a packed programme and I can’t remember a demo with so many finished projects and so much sound advice.

And, of course, we also had a members work display table. Here are a few pictures from that:

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