Author: Alec Mutch

Our Showtime meeting on the 29th April 2021 was to be organised by Geoff Potter and myself, but due to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions this meeting had to be changed to a virtual meeting. Your were all asked to send me pictures of anything you had made recently, there was no actual criteria set down on what to make, we were just asking to see what you had been doing. There was a better response from our members for this meeting than had been the case over the last few months, and for this we are very pleased to see, I hope the increase in participation will continue.

Our next meeting should be on Thursday 29th April 2021, it was to be our spring Showtime meeting, arranged by Geoff Potter and Alec Mutch, however this meeting has been changed into a virtual meeting due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. That does not mean you do not have to do anything, we would like you to send any pictures of your most recent work to me for publication on our web site. There are no stipulations on what you have to make and picture, just send me pictures of anything you have made or indeed in the process of making.

We normally had a very good response to the Showtime meetings in the clubhouse, just because we can’t use the clubhouse for this Showtime meeting does not mean we can’t have just as good a response for this Showtime meeting.

Our meeting this week on Thursday the 15th April 2021 was all about Natural Edged Turnings, this meeting was being arranged by Geoff Potter. It had to be changed into a virtual meeting due to the Covid-19 restrictions. However you were all invited to make something along the lines of the criteria requested. The response was very poor, but we were very grateful for the pictures we received from the limited number who took part, those were David Ross, Dave Line, Nick Simpson, Geoff Potter and myself. As Geoff was handling the meeting he chose to make something using a timeline for you all to follow.

Our next club meeting should be on the 15th April 2021 it was to be organised by Geoff Potter and Geoff’s theme for this meeting is Natural Edged Turnings. This meeting is now a virtual meeting due to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions, however you are all invited to make something along the lines that Geoff has indicated, you can make anything at all as long as it has some element of Natural Edge about it. Having made your item or items, take some pictures and send them to me for publication on our club web site, do remember to give me as much information on what you have made as possible,

We are looking forward to receiving a lot of your pictures, the response in the past has been quite poor so lets make amends and send me lots of your pictures, I’m sure the vast majority of our members would like to see what you have made.

Our meeting on the 1st April 2021 was organised by Nick Simpson, the theme for the meeting was Green Woodturning (or wet woodturning), this is using wood that has just been fresh cut and not had any time to dry. The meeting had to be changed into a virtual meeting due to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions. However you were all invited to produce something along these lines and to send your pictures to me. The response was as is usual very disappointing due to the numbers taking part, there were only 2 people who took part, Nick Simpson and myself, I think the members could really do a lot better.

Our next meeting should be on Thursday 1st April 2021, this meeting has been turned into a virtual meeting due to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions. The meeting was to be managed by Nick Simpson and Nick’s theme for the meeting was green woodturning. Green woodturning is using wood that is still wet or fresh cut, this can still be achieved with good results if you know what you are doing, It can also be very interesting to see what actually happens to a piece of wet turned work after it has dried out, sometimes it can be quite beneficial but on other times a complete disaster. If you do make anything with wet or fresh cut wood, try to cut it very thin, this will give you the best chance of making something that after it dries is still useable. Wet turning can be very good when making items that are natural edged, these can distort in the drying and because of the natural edge can be difficult to see the distortion.

Our virtual meeting on the 18th March 2021 was the Easter competition. The theme for the competition was to make Chess Pieces, the competition was arranged by Nick Simpson and was judged by Nick Simpson and Errol Levings. There were 3 categories for the competition, beginners, intermediate and experienced, each category had a different set of criteria set for them to follow, the beginners were requested to make a Chess Piece of any rank, the intermediate category were requested to make 2 Chess Pieces that were matching of equal rank, the experienced category were requested to make 2 matching Chess Pieces of equal rank from Rook (Castle), Knight or Bishop plus 1 Queen or King. Here are the results of the competition.

The Beginners category was won by Jeff Buttress for his Queen.

Here is an update on the recent Chess Pieces competition. The closing date for the entries passed at midnight on the 18th March 2021. There were 9 entries in total. 5 came from the beginners category and 4 came from the experienced category, unfortunately we had no entries from the intermediate category.

All the entries have now been passed on to the judges with the members names having been removed, the result of the competition will be announced here on the 26th March, the individual winners will be notified by email at the same time.

The judges for this competition are Nick Simpson and Errol Levings.

We want to take this opportunity to thank all of those who took part in the competition.