Category: Photos from meetings

Our virtual meeting on “Inside Out Turning” was on Thursday 28th May 2020 It was to be organised by myself, I was going to demonstrate the methods used to produce an Inside Out Turning, however as this was not possible due to the lockdown we made it a virtual meeting instead. I was to be the only turner for this demonstration, we were not going to use all the lathes as is the normal practice. On that basis I decided I would handle this more like a tutorial rather than the normal proceedure where we just show some pictures with a little text, I will take you through the making of an Inside Out Turning.

The membership were invited to do an inside out turning to be shown on this post, however I have only received one other entry for the Inside Out Turning, I was hoping for a few more but I do realise that this type of turning may have been a step to far for the some of our members.

I did receive a couple of pictures of other turnings from another member, and they will be shown here, I did invite everyone to enter any piece of turning if they felt the Inside Out Turning was not for them.

First up is the only Inside Out Turning I received from Nick Simpson, this is what he had to say about his picture.

Morning Alec

If you are short of photos this is one I did a while ago.

It is 9” tall and made from sycamore. The inside is spray painted gold and the outside stained with spirit stain and satin lacquer.

Regards

Nick Simpson.

Next are a couple of pictures from Dave Line, not Inside Out Turnings, just items he has made recently, this is what Dave had to say about them,

Hi Alec.

I tried inside out turning after John Ruickbie demonstrated a couple of years ago but the result was a complete disaster so when I saw the programme for this year I was looking forward to this week when Alec would be demonstrating inside out turning so I could have another go.

So no inside out turning but 2 items I have made in the last couple of weeks.

The first is a lamp, 280mm high and 120mm Dia. The body is Ash and the feature rings are Sycamore and Sapele , it is finished with wood wax and friction polish.

The second is a clock of 150mm Dia it is very simple but my first use of millput which I think sets it off quite well, the wood is Copper Beech and finished with melamine lacquer.

Now for my own tutorial on Inside Out Turnings.

For those wishing to follow the tutorial start at the fourth picture and go through them in sequence they are all on a step by step basis for you to follow, and good luck with this, if you don’t try you will never know how interesting it can make woodturning, for a larger picture and the text just click any picture, a full sized picture should appear.

Our next Virtual meeting is on the 11th June 2020, that too is being organised by myself, it’s on a much simpler turning this time, it’s all about making weed pots, now that something that everyone can do and can enter for publication, so get to making weed pots and lots of them and send your pictures to me but don’t forget to tell us all about them.

Remember the clubhouse remains closed.

Our next meeting should have been on the 28th May 2020 but due to the lockdown this meeting will be handled virtually. It was to be organised by myself demonstrating how to make an inside-out or involuted turning. This type of turning usually consisted of 3 or 4 pieces of wood held by temporarily gluing the pieces together (paper joint method) to create a cylinder where the turning that would ultimately be on the inside is turned first on the outside with the ends untouched at this stage, the whole assembly would then be taken apart and reversed so that all the turnings are now on the inside, the pieces would then be glued permanently, allowed to dry and then turned. I have given you a few pictures of one I did myself and one that John Ruickbie did at a demo in 2018, you can follow what we did if you wish or come up with your own idea for any form of inside-out turning, but do have a go at this and send your pictures to me.

Do have a go at this and send me the pictures, some of them could be as it’s being made along with the finished article and some information to go with it. If you don’t feel comfortable to make one of these turnings, send me pictures of anything else you make instead, we still want to see your pictures, so keep them coming.

All pictures to be sent to me at, a.j.mutch4321@btinternet.com

Do remember that the clubhouse remains closed.

Our Platters virtual meeting took place this week on Thursday 14th May 2020, it was being organised by Peter Lawrence but had to be made into a virtual meeting due to the lockdown. We did get some response from the members, not as much as I would have liked, 9 of our 65 members submitted pictures of their work and for that we are very grateful, however that meant that 56 did not, and that also included 7 of the 12 committee members. It does appear that since we started the virtual meetings that there are a handful of members who are more than willing to take part with the rest taking little interest, this is most disappointing because we are trying to keep the interest in the club alive and that will only happen if you all participate. I do hope that at the next virtual meeting in 2 weeks time there will be a better response, we were also asking for you to put any pictures in of anything you were doing outwith the virtual meetings in for publication on our web site and facebook page, this too seems to have come to a complete halt.

There are a total of 30 pictures submitted by our members along with some text, I will put this into 2 sections, the text being the first section and the pictures in a second as a picture gallery. Here are the text entries.

Pictures 1 to 3 are from Alan Ross.

Platter made from mahogany (not certain)
22.5cm x 3cm
sanded to 400grit, sanding sealer, cut’n’polish then wax 22.

Regards,

Alan Ross

Pictures 4 & 5 are from Bob Chisholm.

A Sycamore Platter measuring 300 mm x 35 mm, it was sanded to 400 grit then sealed with sanding sealer, re-sanded with 400grit and a coat of Melamine applied, it was then buffed to a soft sheen,

Regards,

Bob  Chisholm.

Pictures 6 to 10 are from Cliff Sim.

Good evening, Geoff. I attach photos of my recent work. Unfortunately my oak platter had a few breakouts hence the reason it became more of a bob-bon dish instead. I took heart from Alec’s recent showing to finish off my table lamp using two lignum vitae bowls, one cut in half, and the other mounted on top . I drilled a separate piece of odd wood I had tuned as I originally planned to use a metal pipe to connect the lamp holder but couldn’t  get a fitting of the requisite size. The other half of the bowl I turned to make a small trinket dish as shown, just like Alec’s, though not nearly so skillfully nor tastefully made. I turned small pieces of contrasting wood to glue in the bases to flatten them and hide the turning recesses. I applied sanding sealer, melamine lacquer then chestnut wax polish to all the items.

 Best, Cliff Sim.

Pictures 11 to 13 are from Dave Line.

Hi Alec,

Here are 3 platters I have made.

The 1st is 170mm dia, it is made from Ash with Mahogany insert, the only problem I encountered was getting the mahogany inserts to bend without cracking, also cutting the blank, this has to be done (very accurately) when the blank is still square so that it can be clamped when the glue is drying It is finished off with food safe finish.

The 2nd is 200mm dia made from Ash. The blank is first turned then sprayed with Ebonising Lacquer (cheap mat black spray paint from Aldi) then the blank is rotated at 2000rpm on the lathe when dry and “Butt It” paint flicked onto the blank whilst rotating. The platter is then turned where required to remove unwanted paint and finished off.

The third is only 150mm dia and my first attempt at using Pabeo Prisme paint and as can be seen I need lot’s more practice.

Keep safe Dave Line.

Pictures 14 to 18 are from Errol Levings.

Hi Alec

Two very plain platters from the same piece of Tibetan spruce- still fairly wet with lots of resin. Very soft, some ripple and short grain so kept thickness up. Needed very sharp tools to cut clean. Had hoped the spruce would have been easier to use – some lovely ripple near the bole. These two platters are 120mm by 15mm. Will finish with OSMO foodsafe oil – have only had one coat so far. 

Errol Levings 

Pictures 19 & 20 are from Geoff Potter.

Alec find attached my platter.

OAK PLATTER

The platter was made from an unpromising thin piece of oak. The wood was thoroughly dry and had a waxed circumference. There was an obvious knot and a section that looked like it might fly off! I used very short screws to attach it to my face plate and used my revolving centre as support until I became convinced it wouldn’t all Frisbee off my lathe. I turned the base including the mortise to suit my chuck. I decided that because of the thin section I would keep the mortise after I had finished so took the opportunity to decorate it with a few grooves. These grooves would probably impress my friends but wouldn’t impress many Woodturners. 

It took at least 6 applications of superglue and wood dust at various times to stabilise the knots and cracks.

The top with its very shallow dish looked too plain so I used two small grooves to highlight the rim/dish boundary.

I like the result, the oak has an impressive set of grain and medullary rays. Its finished with sanding seal, sanded to 400 grit, melamine and a wax. The platter is 220 x 15mm. Quite a thin turning for me.

Regards,

Geoff Potter.

Pictures 21 to 23 are from Gordon Leitch.

Evening Alex I enclose photos of 2 platters 

One is made of oak 

38.5 across 

122cm circumference  

The other is made of elm 

36cm across 

115 circumference 

Regards 

Gordon Leitch.

Picture 24 is from Nick Simpson.

Hi Alec

I haven’t had time to turn a platter this week with gardening and HWC business

I thought members might like this. It is called ‘Reflections of…….’

It is a composition of two adjacent slices through the grafted crown of a flowering cherry.

The frame is just that. It gives the sense of a mirror and, in fact, the judge in the Borders Woodworkers Open competition asked the Borders club chairman why someone would bring a mirror to a competition for woodturnings.

The platters are 7” diameter and textured followed by pyrography.

Kind regards

Nick Simpson.

Pictures 25 to 30 are from Alec Mutch.

I have made 3 new platters this week, also shown a couple of smaller platters I had made in the past, all of them have something different to offer.

1, This is an Elm platter it measured 305 mm in diameter by about 40 mm deep, I brought the bowl through the rim by creating 2 small beads on top of the rim.

2, This is an Olive Ash platter it measured 330 mm in diameter by about 40 mm deep, I decorated the rim  using a laser.

3,  Another Elm platter, it measured 305 mm in diameter by about 50 mm deep, I cut some Celtic design inserts for the rim and set them in by drilling a series of shallow recesses to accommodate the inserts, I then used some Milliput to fill the recesses before completing the turning, the Milliput was allowed to harden over night.

4, A smaller Ash platter, with a decorated rim. I used some Pebeo paints for this, the  base coat was Black Vitrail and the Blue was Pebeo Moon, both were allowed to dry for several days before finishing the turning.

5,  Another Ash shallow platter, measuring 250 mm by 30 mm again with a decorated rim, this time the paint is Pebeo Prisme in 3 different colours, these paints are oil based and can be applied at the same time then allowed to dry over several days, in the process they react to each other and produce the formations you see on the rim.

6, I have included a picture of my Laser in operation, it’s a LOBO 6040 CNC machine, it can do engraving or cutting with the use of a suitable computer programme.

Regards,

Alec Mutch.

This is a late entry from John Ruickbie, it’s very relevant to what’s going on at present so I have given it front of house prominence.

This is what John had to say about his entry,

 This is a tribute to the work being done combating the virus it is more a plaque than a platter. The centre is the virus which I have given a black centre.  Each group is a spear of sycamore piercing the virus. The overall diameter is 290mm and the stand is elm.

Regards.

John Ruickbie.

To get a full sized picture of any in the gallery just click the picture, we hope you find the pictures interesting and encouraging, and perhaps on the next virtual meeting you too could have your work posted here. We look forward to seeing what you can do.

Do remember the clubhouse remains closed.

The showtime meeting scheduled for the 30th April 2020 has now become a virtual meeting, (it will not take place at the clubhouse) we will be treating this meeting on line. We need you all to send in your pictures and some text on the items you would have brought to the showtime meeting, you can send in more than one picture, in fact more the merrier. We had a reasonably good response to the last virtual meeting on Natural edged turnings, we had 44 pictures for that meeting, I want to see at least this amount, preferably more for this virtual meeting, remember it can be of anything you have made turned or otherwise, we are looking for a very good response so please send me your pictures along with a bit of information on each item.

Get busy in your workshops and produce as many items that you can. we want to see lots of entries.

Send your pictures and text to me by email to a.j.mutch4321@btinternet.com

All entries to be received by Thursday 30th April 2020, and thank you for taking part.

Do remember the clubhouse remains closed.

As you are all aware our normal meeting would have been tonight 16th April 2020, as this did not happen we asked you to make this a virtual meeting, treating the meeting as if it had happened. The subject of the meeting was working with natural edges or inclusions and we asked you to make something along those lines and have it finished for the 16th April, we then asked you to send some pictures of what you had made for inclusion on our web site. I am very pleased to report that 10 members have done exactly what we wanted you to do and sent a total of 44 pictures along with some text, the best way to show all these is with a picture gallery, the text I will deal with separately, I will give the name of the member followed by a number system to identify whose pictures belong to whom, these will all be listed here and the pictures will follow.

Pictures 1 to 6 are from Alan Ross. Thanks for giving us something to target our efforts on.
Find attached photos of live edge bowl I have had a go at making.
dia- 150mm x 80mm high.
Made from a birch log with three branches on it.
Finished with sanding sealer and sanded to 400 grit. Three coats of melamine lacquer,   buffed with ‘cut and paste’ then polished with Wood wax 22
Alan Ross (Nairn) .

Pictures 7 to 11 are from Dave Hutcheson.

Hope you are all well and staying safe. Here’s a hollow form I made today.This unusual blank came straight out of the firewood pile so required a wee bit of thinking as how to approach it. It’s a natural edged hollow form in burr elm and it’s finished with Liberon finishing oil. It measures 130mm wide by 95mm high. The branch inclusion only became apparent once turning was underway but I think it adds to the overall effect. 

Cheers Dave Hutcheson 

Pictures 12 to 14 are from Dave Line.

Please find attached Pictures of a couple of natural edge bowls as requested by Geoff.The 1st I made today is cross grain, it’s 150mm Dia by 90mm high. I don’t know what kind of wood it is. I picked it up a couple of years ago when I came across someone chopping a tree down in his garden.The second 2 are pictures of end grain turning I made a while back, again I don’t know what wood it is, I got it from you about a year ago. It is about 200mm high by about 140mm Dia.

Regards Dave Line.

Pictures 15 to 19 are from David Hobson.

The Bowl is made from Cherry

Finished with sanding sealer ,Yorkshire Grit and Liberon liquid wax

Size  230. X200 x 80.

David Hobson

Pictures 20 to 24 are from Errol Levings.

Hope the attached will be of interest.
As you can see, a very spalted piece of silver birch crotch of too small an angle between branches, so bark is included very deeply into the vase.  Quite punky and difficult to avoid the soft bits breaking out – lots of sanding sealer and CA glue to harden them. Did not dare to  make either a spigot or tenon, so sized bottom to fit direct into 965 mm chuck.  Angle of bottom could have been slightly better to avoid marking by the chuck, despite several layers of masking tape to cushion the re-chuck.  Also there had been some movement of the wood so no longer fully concentric.

Thank goodness we all live in our wide open environment and have our workshops as part of our “home.”
Kind regards
Errol Levings.

Pictures 25 & 26 are from Geoff Potter.

Here’s my submission of a natural edge bowl.
The small bowl is made from wood which I won in the Club’s fortnightly raffle and it is Laburnum I believe. The bowl was finished with a 400 grit abrasive, sanding seal and a melomine finish – inside and out. The bowl measures 15 by 7 cm.
Laburnum wood is highly coloured, retains its bark well and seems to produce a very glossy smooth finish.

Geoff Potter

Pictures 27 to 30 are from Hamish Stuart.

Hope you are all well and staying safe. Had a wee play this afternoon don’t know if it’s any good to you but thought I would send it anyway. Finished with melamine 

Hamish Stuart.

Pictures 31 to 34 are from John Ruickbie.

I decided  to make a natural edge clock for this occasion and wanted to change from the usual form. I used the first slice from a log the outer one with the bark on it. The circumference is important if it is too  small the clock face resess will be too deep as in the first one I tried which  was made of elm. The second attempt was made with sycamore and has a much shallower face. I also used a lighter base which improved the overall effect. I have included both pictures.

John Ruickbie.

Pictures 35 & 36 are from Nick Simpson.

Here are 2 natural edge pieces now that my workshop is up and running.The first is one of my own sycamore trees from Northumberland. It is a section of sound wood from a rotted-back section of branch at the trunk. It measures 8” by 4”. The damaged edges have been textured by burr and then scorched and wire-brushed. Finish was by sanding sealer (after scorching!) and Renaissance wax.

The vase is from a Yew branch in which the natural edge section was simply the irregularity characteristic of yew but the bark couldn’t be retained.. It is hollowed to 8mm but heavier at the base and stands 6” tall. Finished with 10-400 mirca, sanding sealer and Renaissance wax, which I like because it resists fingermarks.

Best wishes

Nick Simpson.

Pictures 37 to 44 are from me, Alec Mutch.

They show a natural edged bowl I made some time ago from a piece of Laburnum, it measured about 200 mm in length and just over 100 mm in height. The finish was my normal finish of Sanding sealer followed by a coat of Melamine and then buffed to a soft sheen. I like to use some weird shapes of blanks, as you will see it was made from a branch intersection.

Alec Mutch.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you who took the time to make your items and more so to then send them to me for this post, we will be repeating this process for every meeting we have to miss due to this Virus, the next meeting would be on the 30th April 2020 and that will also be a Virtual meeting, the programme for that meeting is a Showtime meeting, it would normally be handled by myself. You can start to think of what you might make for this meeting, just imagine you will be there and send me the pictures of what you would have taken along for the members to see, remember there is no actual criteria for this meeting, just make whatever you like and send me the pictures and the text of course, pictures for this to be in by the 29th April. This should not stop you sending me any other pictures to upload between now and then, so keep sending me your pictures.

Remember the club house is still closed, you will be notified when we will re-start our meetings again, but in the meantime I hope you all stay safe from this deadly virus.

Our meeting on the 5th March 2020 was all about making wooden goblets. The meeting was organized by David Hutcheson and David had arranged for 4 more turners to man all the lathes, they would all be making goblets but not all the same design nor would their method of approach to making a goblet be the same. The turnout of members for this meeting was excellent and the 5 turners kept those observing occupied and fully involved with what they were all doing. The evening went very well and we hope those observing found it interesting and informative. The following gallery of pictures along with a little text should give you a flavour of just how the evening went, the pictures for this meeting were taken by Uisdean MacBeth.

We hope you enjoyed looking through all the pictures and taken on board some of the work practices that the turners employed.

Our next meeting is on the 19th March and it’s competition time once again, it’s being organized by David Hutcheson and it’s all about making wooden boxes, there will be 3 categories as usual, details to follow.

Our club meeting on the 20th February 2020 was all about the use of a bandsaw, it was organized and carried out by John Ruickbie. John firstly discussed the setting up of the bandsaw, this covered things like the setting of the guide bearings for the blade, the height of the blade guard and the tension in the blade, all these things were discussed with the power source being isolated, I.E. the machine was not plugged in. John stressed the importance of having the machine isolated whilst any of the setting up or maintenance was being carried out. He also went on to discuss that the correct type of blade should be used for the purpose intended, and drew attention to the blade chart posted near the bandsaw that gave the correct blade type and size for both straight and curved cuts, this chart is now also on our web site. John went on to demonstrate using the bandsaw, making use of some home made aids like push sticks, he also showed another useful aid for use with the bandsaw, a parallel clamp that he had made, this clamp is particularly useful when cutting very small pieces of wood that are used in polychromatic assemblies. John then said he would make one of these clamps but due to the restrictions of time he had done some of the work at home, leaving the remainder to be done at the club, the clamp had some specialised tools required to make the clamp and he was to demonstrate their use, this involved a threading system. John went on to make the final pieces required to make the clamp, assembling the finished clamp and showing it to the very attentive crowd.

The turnout of members for this meeting was the highest I had ever seen at any meeting in all my time attending the club meetings, so much so that we ran out of chairs, reducing quite a few members to standing room only, for this the club apologizes. The following gallery of pictures with a little text should give you a flavour of just how the meeting went, pictures by Alec Mutch.

If you would like to make one of these clamps, there is a post on our web site with a sketch of the clamp giving all it’s dimensions, the use of a threading tap and box is required, it might be possible to borrow these from John or myself if you want to make one.

The chart with all the blade sizes and their use is also on our web site should you wish to print off a copy.

Our next meeting is on the 5th March, it’s being organized by David Hutcheson and it’s all about making goblets.

We hope you all enjoyed John’s presentation and found it both interesting and informative, and we thank you all for your attendance.

Our AGM (Annual General Meeting) took place on Thursday 6th February 2020, there was a good turnout for the meeting, the purpose of an AGM is to communicate what has happened over the past year and to discuss with the members anything they wish to raise. Reports were given by the Chairman, the Secretary and the Treasurer. This meeting also deals with who is on the committee, ratifying those committee members wishing to stay on the committee along with proposing any new members onto the committee, for a complete list of all the office bearers log on to our web site for all the positions and who filled them. Suffice to say 10 of the existing committee members remained on the committee for another year, we did have 2 resignations and they have been replaced with 2 new members onto the committee. The minutes of the meeting are now available in the members section of our web site, log on using the username and password.

Our next club meeting is on the 20th February 2020 and it will be managed by John Ruickbie, John is going to give a tutorial on the use of a bandsaw and also make a tool on the lathe for use with a bandsaw. We will also have a committee meeting that evening, the first of the new year and will include the new members on the committee, start time for the committee meeting, 5.30pm, start time for the main meeting 6.45pm, hope to see you all there.

Our meeting on the 23rd January 2020 was all about making wooden toys and puzzles, the meeting was organised by Douglas Stewart, Douglas had arranged for 4 turners to work the lathes, Bill Munro, John Ruickbie, Nick Simpson and himself. Each person would be doing something different, and the members attendance was very good. The following gallery of pictures along with a little text should give you a flavour of how the evening went. The pictures were all taken courtesy of Mike Day.

We hope you found the toy and puzzle making projects interesting and enjoyable.

Our next meeting is the annual AGM meeting, it will be on the 6th February starting at the usual time of 6.45pm.

This next meeting will be the last opportunity for any member to pay their fees for the 2020 meetings, miss that date and your place could be taken by someone on the waiting list.