Posted on by Alec Mutch

Report on our latest training day 19-05-2022.

Our latest training day was on Thursday 19th May 2022, we had all 5 lathes in use along with 5 tutors. Most of the pupils were on their 2nd or 3rd training days, along with one trainee on their first session. Some finishing off their bowl work training and now starting on spindle training whilst the others were already doing some spindle training, and one pupil just starting with the bowl work.

The evening started with our Training Manager Nick Simpson giving his customary talk on the use of PPE and safety on the lathes.

Along with the 5 pupils and 5 tutors we had 2 observers in attendance. As one of the observers I took a few photo’s of the proceedings throughout the evening, here are those pictures along with some information on the pictures .

1, on lathe 5, we have Nick Simpson(tutor left) and James Montgomery (pupil Right) just starting on spindle turning. 2, here James can be seen rounding over his piece of wood, the wood is Pitch Pine, good to work all be it with a little bit of resin making for a slightly sticky surface. 3, Here Nick has James working on forming beads and coves. 4, Now with a new piece of wood, here James is working on rounding over the end of the piece of wood.
5, on lathe 4, we have Joe Webster (pupil left) with David Hobson (tutor centre), Joe was still working on bowl turning and for this session he was using a piece of African Padauk, in this picture we see Joe making his first cuts on the outside of the bowl. 6, the outside of his bowl almost complete, Joe is being guided through the process by David to take fine cuts as he nears the end of the outside shaping.
7, On lathe 3, this is Carol Craig just joined our club and starting on bowl work being tutored by John Ruickbie, here Carol has been shown how to make the first cuts and is now putting that into practice, the wood she is using is a piece of Sweet Chestnut. 8, here John is showing Carol how to make the first of the shaping cuts on the outside of their bowl. 9, Now working on the inside, John keeps a close watch over her as she is instructed on how to use the tool on the inside of the bowl. 10, Carol is being shown how to work the base of their bowl using a set of bowl jaws to remove all trace of the holding method.
11, on lathe 2, we have Darren Morrison (pupil left) with David Ross (tutor right). Darren was finishing off a bowl he started at a previous meeting, Here David is showing Darren how to use the tool on the inside of a bowl. 12, David moved Darren onto some spindle turning after they completed the bowl, here he can be seen rounding over the wood blank. 13, In this picture David is explaining the use of the bevels on the tools. 14, Here Darren can be seen forming some beads and coves, the fundamentals of spindle turning.
15, on lathe 1, we have Susan Drew being tutored by Errol Levings, here Errol has Susan working on spindle turning, he has her rounding over the blank prior to any shaping taking place. 16, Before getting Susan to start to form some of the spindle shapes, Errol explained the different shapes and cuts required on the board first. 17,Now Errol has Susan doing some of the beads and coves under his supervision. 18, Susan continues to form some beads and coves, again as Errol supervises her progress.

The training session ended at approximately 8.45pm and it was now time to do the clean up, just after that I got a picture of all the pupils and their evenings work, here is that picture.

Here we have the pupils all with happy faces, having spoken to them about their experience on the lathes, all were very pleased with their progress.

That ended the training session for this evening, the next training session would be on June the 2nd 2022.

A big thank you to Nick and the tutors for their organisation and dedication in making all of this happen.