Classical

Posted on 1. August 2017 by fuzzy

Many of my more intricate turnings are based on paper designs, and sometimes it takes several drawings before I get the proportions right. The final product is then the result of implementing the design as close as possible to the drawing.

There are however other things I make, where the path is completely different. I have whole shelves full of half-turned or finish turned items awaiting some final decoration or colouring or what not. Many of these will remain on these shelves for another month or two or maybe even a year, until I feel inspired to do something with them.

This shallow bowl or dish is one of those that I have actually finished. Made from rippled sycamore, with a very classical, simple, elegant shape, a few beads as decoration on the rim, and some blue and gold accents to frame the actual bowl in the centre. None of this was planned or designed, it just happened.

This dish is about 14″ diameter and stands about 3″ tall. The colour is textile dye, with a 2 layer approach for the gold accents (fontenay base and warm gold paint on top), all sealed with 2 coats of acrylic spray lacquer.

As I get more experienced with my turning and decoration skills, I feel more and more torn between these two paths, the inspirational free-wheeling and the controlled design approach. Both have their advantages and allures, challenges and shortcomings.

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Eggs!

Posted on 25. July 2017 by fuzzy

Does anybody know the collective pronoun for eggs? I believe it’s a gaggle of chickens, but I haven’t got a clue what it is for eggs.

However, apparently eggs sell really well at craft shows. But I haven’t got many (or any, actually). So, a couple of weeks back I decided to change that. I started with a few pieces of curly (rippled) sycamore, then added a stick of yew, and a few offcuts of other species (ash, laburnum).

There is really not that much to it. Turn between centres for the most part of the shape, and sand to finish (about 240 or 320 grit unless it’s yew or other hard stuff, where you want to go to about 400 or 600). The comes the trick: cut off the two ends. Make yourself an egg-chuck. That is essentially a tube from relatively soft wood, with the inside diameter just slightly more than your largest egg (oh, did I mention that they should all be more or less the same diameter? Otherwise this gets very time consuming).

Then make a recess about 1/2″ from the open end, and check that you can fit a pipe clamp into that. Now cut slits into the tube, about 2-3″ deep. 6 slits (3 cuts across) should do the trick. Fit the pipe clamp on, and hey presto, there’s your egg-chuck. By the way, the same principle applies for fruit, just different diameters, that’s all.

Now mount your egg into the chuck, making sure the unfinished end sticks out far enough to get a decent cut on it. Centre the egg, tighten the clamp and finish the end. Reverse, lather, rinse, done.

I finish all my eggs first with some paste wax and then with my own hardwax mixture, and once the wax has set a little, they get polished with a buffing wheel.

Clearly I will need a whole lot more than just these 11. So, at some point during the next few months, I’ll have to dedicate an entire day or maybe even weekend to just making eggs. Loads of eggs. Really big clutches of eggs. Ooops, now I have given it away.

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At last

Posted on 23. July 2017 by fuzzy

I know I haven’t been posting lately. It’s down to a combination of factors.

Firstly, I did not (and still do not) have a setup for my photo tent. In essence I need a day with nice sunshine, on a weekend, with nothing else that needs doing and then I can take pictures. Today was such a day and I have taken some pictures.

Secondly, we are getting quite busy with the house. Even though most of the actual work is done by craftsmen, just doing the little runaround jobs is taking quite some time.

Thirdly, I have been quite busy with all sorts of small commissions. I generally don’t take pictures of these, as most of them are not really my style and more of a technical nature (frames for china dishes, and gas torch handles, and the likes).

Fourth, I don’t like posting blogs without images. They make for dry reading, and I think images just make it all so much more interesting. After all, this is a blog about wood turning, not politics.

So, pictures are in the bag, and uploaded, and now we are ready to rock. Here’s an overview of all the things to come:

We’ll have a separate blog post for most of these, as they all have a story to tell.

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Hard landing

Posted on 13. June 2017 by fuzzy

A while ago I posted about an inquiry I had for extra large candle sticks, 1000mm  tall, in 2 different designs and a slightly smaller version in 600mm tall. The inquiry was for 50 units for a wedding.

Well, sadly that whole thing has completely imploded. I made a huge effort in making 6 samples, in varying finishes and in 2 different timbers, recorded all my working times and materials used, prepared a quote, and collected quotes from subcontractors and timber suppliers. And then I find out that these guys have completely unrealistic ideas about this sort of stuff. Figures of £15 for a 600mm candlestick in pine were bandied about the place.

I am not sure where folks like that live. Here in the UK we have something called a minimum wage, and as I type this, that wage is £7.50 for a normal worker. That’s not even a skilled worker, that’s just somebody who’s got enough wherewithal to follow instructions. You go into any skilled labour and this figure goes up rapidly. And this is just what the boss has to pay his workers, not what he needs to charge customers to survive as a business.

I am not trying to rip people off, and when I spoke to the possible subcontractors, my figures about timescales and hourly rates were confirmed by them (for this sort of job I usually quote £25 per hour).

The normal formula for making and selling anything is (material + labour) x 2. Simple enough, and essentially meant to cover all your non-productive time (e.g. time spent on writing quotes, sourcing materials, cleaning and maintaining machinery and so on). So now, presuming that the material for this 600mm candlestick in pine is about £4, we come to a result as follows:

£15/2 = £7.50 – £4 = £3.50 for labour.

Considering an hourly rate of £25 this means that everything (cutting, turning, gluing, sanding, sealing, spraying) is done in 8-9 minutes. Or, using my actual time used, I end up with an hourly rate of about £1.75. Either way is totally unrealistic, unless we have Vietnamese slave children at our disposal (and are happy to have this on our conscience).

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Best workshop ever

Posted on 6. June 2017 by fuzzy

The last 6 months have been a lot of hard work, but it’s finally paying off. I now have space in my new workshop, which is quite a luxury for me. I am not used to that.

There’s still a lot to do, though. I still need to install the compressed air pipe system, and I haven’t got the new chop saw, band saw or pillar drill, although I have in fact finished work on the rotating tool station:

I also started making all the knobs and handles for the various drawers and cupboard doors. This is probably the only workshop in the UK to have knobs made from solid ebony. One of our friends found a bucket with all sorts of cutoffs when they sorted out one of their garden sheds, and gave it to me with the words “Maybe these are good for something, they are definitely useless as firewood, much too small”. The whole bucket was filled to the rim with short cutoffs of ebony (1″ – 1.5″ long) and walnut (2.5″ – 3″ long), all from 1.5″ square stock.  Not much good for anything else, but they do make very nice knobs.

Considering ebony is on all sorts of lists, and in the “cannot buy for its weight in gold” category, this is quite a windfall.

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