Rick, Paul, J Hiltz, Miles

Leo discussed techniques to fill soft areas on wood and the use of various glues to fill in voids.

Miles brought in a steady rest that he had. It was quite sturdy looking and simple to make.

We worked on the acacia wood blanks and used Leo's new turning jig to round out some bowls.

Leo discussed how to use geometry to design bowl with various arcs (curves) from circular to oval or egg shaped.

Fall2013 Sessions

Accacia

Rick, J Hiltz, Paul, Brian

We continued to work on the accacia bowl blanks using the mechanized jig that Leo has been perfecting to turn even shapes.

Paul worked on the large vase project.

Leo discusses using cold rolled square stock steel to make tools for the chucks
(to enable the chuck to be tightened securely when the regular tool is awkward to try to use.)
Ratchet wrenches can be adapted to this by filing the ends of the socket slightly so that it fits into the slot in the chuck.

We agreed to do a workshop on the metal lathe some evening this year.

New Season

Miles, Paul, Rick and Jim Hiltz were present

Leo has almost perfected his bowl making jig and using this, we spent the evening turning down the Accacia bowl blanks that we had prepared last week.

The wood is spectacular in grain..a beautiful yellow/green colour.

The mechanism Leo has designed makes it a pleasure to turn the rough blank into a beautiful shape.

We will likely spend the next few sessions doing these.

We were pondering the idea of a session on basic metal lathe technique and will try to get the Professor to consider this.

Vase

Rick, Paul, Miles, Brian, Chris

Paul drilled out his vase..made a mistake by not cutting off the end base first and so the hole goes all the way through and will have to be plugged eventually.

Practiced finding the centers on the lathe by using a chalk mark as the piece turns and tapping the end of the wood until it is centered correctly.

This seems to be quite effective as locating a center.

Use increasingly large drills to get the holes bores out.

Best to start with a centering bit like a machinists bit to get the hole started accurately.

Vase project Photos

Vase

April 30/13

Rick, Paul, Miles, Brian, J MacLean, J Hiltz

Tip:

A Jarno taper is what most drill press Jacob Chucks have.

This won’t fit into a morse taper tailstock .

Leo advises that when driving a Morse taper onto the lathe or drill press, open the jaws and use a deadman rod to tap the chick in. Don not hit the end of the jaws to do this.

1 Then center the tailstock end.
2 Turn the square and if one corner is off, stabilize the tailstock center with a block of wood under it, then tap the wood blank  with a mallet to move it in the proper direction. This shifts the wood slightly on the 4 screws.
3 Repeat this until the tailstock end is square.
4 Then you can turn the piece to a round cylinder.

5 Remove the temporary block at the tailstock end Reverse the blank, placing the tailstock end into the headstock chuck
6 Use a skew to get a center on the end that is now in the tailstock and take it down so as the drill bits will enter cleanly
7 Then turn the squared end to a round spiggot
8 Part off the end piece according to the diagram, rounding the pieces appropriately

These ends will be tapered

9 Place a sturdy bit in the tailstock and drill a hole. The black lines mark the hole, drilled through to the end. The larger piece is usually reversed to drll both ends, according to the length of your available bits.

10 Gradually enlarge this hole with larger bits. By enlarging the opening to a close fit for the bit to enter , a Forstner bit can be used to drill as the hole gets larger
11 Finish drilling with a sturdy large diameter bit

Rick did his vase project on Leo's lathe.
He went through all the steps down to drilling the hole by the time the evening was up.

Vase project Photos

Vase

Brian, Miles, Rick

Continued the vase project.

Everyone hada pretty good glue-up square.

Leo suggested taking a block plane and fair off the edges of the square.

Then use a square to find the exact center, using a scribe knife.

Then take a round block of wood to screw onto the top. Center it with a brad.

Then drill 4 holes around the periphery and screw the temporary block onto the top.

Use one colored screw (green) so as to be able to mark where the holes are for relocation and make a pencil line on the wood by the green screw.

This end is going on the tailstock.

Cut a square boss on the opposite end.

His will fit into the 4-jaw chuck.

Make it small enough to engage the chuck  jaws easily (1 7/8 about)

Mount this boss onto the 4-jaw at the headstock.

Using the tool rest, turn the square by hand to see how closely it is centered. If one corner is off, remove the piece, put masking tape onto the boss at the opposite corner and re mount.

Do this repeatedly until you have your square centered.

The center the tailstock end.

Turn the square and if one corner is off, stabilize the tailstock center with a block of wood under it, then tap the wood with a mallet to move it in the proper direction.

Repeat this until the tailstock end is square.

Then you can turn the piece to a round cylinder.

Tip:

A Jarno taper is what most drill press Jacob Chucks have.

This won’t fit into a morse taper tailstock .

Vase project Photos

Vase continued

Paul, Brian and Miles

Leo explained more about the thicknesser.

The table is suspended from the top on two large screws and is raised and lowered on these. As wood enters and the first roller hits it, it actually tilts the table slightly, ths causing the snipe until the outfeed roller is encountered. If a stick of wood is jammed under the table (eg for the final planing cut) it prevents the tilt and snipe. Leo’s planer has two rollers on top and two underneath. The smaller ones have just the two top rollers.

He then went over the glue-up. 

For the top and bottom slabs, he first glues up the thinner slats by placing them all together and clamping them  (without putting glue on the center between each three mating pieces). This way it is a solider thing for the clamping process. A small dab of glue can be placed at the very ends of the center pieces to keep it from slipping. The ends are cut off once the glue dries. Once these are dry, he glues on the end blocks, keeping everything flat. Once dry you can scrape off the surfaces but you can’t plane any off.

Tip:

If you have several pieces glued and the bottom is uneven, a flat piece can be glued to the underside  center with a dab of glue and then the piece is run through the thicknesser to plane off the top section. Flipping it over it  finishes the job.

Vase project Photos

Vase project continued

March 19/13  Paul, Rick, Brian, Miles

Leo went through the process of using the thickness planer to do exact replications. He demonstrated the use of a wedge, marked with a pencil line so that one can register the same planer adjustment for future cuts of the exact same thickness.

Paul had a glued up square and started the turning.

It was obvious when this was done that unless the blank is carefully glued up and square, the resulting vase profile will be very hard to get uniform.

Leo showed how to use the 4-jaw chuck to get exact centering of the vase mounting.

Use the tool rest, set a corner of it close to one edge of the squared block, rotate the block and note the gap at each corner.

Tape the piece on one end to readjust the center. Until each corner touches the tool rest.

Vase project Photos

March 5/13

Jim Hiltz, J MacLean, Brian, Miles, Chris, Rick, Paul

The lads brought in the vase glue-ups and problems were immediatley noticeable!

Paul had failed to have the center block wide enough.
Rick's was equally shameful.
Jim Hiltz's was barely presentable.

Leo went through the process of designing the colors and patterns again and this time stressed that one has to make a pattern that will suit the available stock.

Eg.:  dont have a square piiece that is to be 2 /18 because it is hard to get stock  to make this. One would have to use 3 inch stock and waste a lot.

Leo calculated the sizes of the pieces that would best suit the small vase and still be suitable to enlarge to the big vase dimensions

The photos show this.

We discussed making a planing board to do thin strips.
This is a very valuable Jig.

See photo.

Use a one inch slab or use 3/4 ply and glue strips under it to get to a one inch slab.

Glue sand paper and a stop on one end .

This will avoid getting snipe on the ends of the planed strips.

When planing the strips on edge, assemble them together and dab glue on the ends.
Once all planed to  proper thickness, cut off the glue ends.

We agreed that Leo would make up the dimensions needed to start a new vase, email it out to us,  and we would get the stock and bring it to the next meeting and plane it up at Leo's.

This was a very valuable session  as far as learning is concerned.

Leo continues to impress members with his vast knowledge base.

STOCK LIST FOR VASE 3 5/8 X13

FINISHED SIZES

WALNUT 1PC. 1 3/8 X 1 3/8 ------- 13”

ASH 4PC 1 3/8 X 3/8 ---------13”

CHERRY 4PC. 1 3/8 X 3/8 ---------13”

WALNUT 4PC. 1 3/8 X 3/8 ---------13”

OAK 4PC. 1 3/8 X 3/8 ---------13”

MAHOGANY 4PC. ¾ X ¾ --------------13”

21PCS.

SUBSTITUTE ANY WOOD SPECIES YOU LIKE AS LONG AS MEASUREMENTS STAY THE SAME

IF YOU DON’T HAVE THE RIGHT STOCK OR SPECIES I THINK I CAN FIND ENOUGH HERE

FROM THE STOCK LIST OF THE SMALL ONE YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU NEED FOR THE LARGER ONES

IF YOU INTEND TO MAKE ONLY ONE VASE NEARLY ANY ARRANGEMENT OF WOODS WILL DO

IF YOU WISH TO MAKE ONE FULL SIZE 0R AS PAUL SUGGESTED A THREE QUARTER SIZE YOU MAY HAVE TO 

CONSIDER THE COLOUR ARRANGEMENT FOR THE MATERIAL IF YOU WANT THEM TO BE THE SAME PATTERN. .

A SET OF THREE PIERCES WELL DONE WOULD REALLY BE SOMETHING

MEASURMENTS ARE FINISHED SIZES ,ALLOW AT LEAST I/8 “ FOR DRESSING AND 1 ½ FOR LENGTH

DRAWINGS ARE ROUGH AND INTENDED ONLY FOR STOCK SELECTION AND THE SIZES NEEDED.

FOR THE FIRST GLUE UP IT WOULD BE ADVISABLE TO MAKE IT AFULL SIZE SQUARE 3 5/8 X3 5/8 X15

BRING STOCK DRESSED STRAIGHT AND FLAT ON ONE SIDE ONLY AND ENOUGH MATERIAL TO FINISH IT UP TO 

THE GIVEN SIZES

Vase project Photos

Feb 19/13

February 19/13

Brian,Rick,Lawrence, J Hiltz, Miles, Chris

We decided on two projects:

1 Bar stool with four legs: top 10-11 inch diameter, legs 30 inches

2 Tapered vase.

Leo went through the methods of reducing the scale of a dimensional drawing. 

The vase is 27 inches tall and 7 inches diameter at the base.

We reduced it by half, using a compass and divider method.

The glue up block should be contrasting wood colors.

Vase prooject Feb/13

Jim MacLean, J Hiltz, Rick, Chris, Miles, Roy, Scott MacLeod, Brian, Paul

Work continured on the trays and rolling pins.

Leo reviewed the finish:

Stain, salad bowl finish x 2, gold acrylic, rub off with Methanol, salad bowl finish.

Leo demonstrated a steel jig he ade to cut three inch sand paper discs on the drill press.

Leo demonstrated a planer that is used on the drill press to plane off a surface.

He showed how to flaten a glued up piece using this method.

Leo discussed table saw blades, explaining the hollow ground type and demonstrating how a swedge is used to flare the teeth

Curved serving tray

Post Xmas meeting

Lawrence, J Hiltz, Paul, Miles, J Maclean, Roy, Chris
(Rick called in sick!)

The lads met on January 8/13 after the Christmas Holliday.
Work continued on the rolling pins and the Sushi tray.
Paul had a turned rolling pin that had no centre drilled.
Leo demonstrated how to drill it on the lathe.
To protect the wood, tape some wooden blocks of equal thickness on the jaws of the 4-jaw chuck.
This is to protect the wood.
The piece is held between centres.
The headstock chuck is rotated and the jaws are tightened in individually until the wood is centered.
An accurate way to do this is to place one end of a long stick under the workpiece, extending away from the lathe and resting on the tool rest.
As the headstock is turned by hand the far end of this stick can be seen to go up and down according to the degree that the piece is out of centre.
Adjust the jaws accordingly until there is very little movement at the end of the stick.

Leo has been granted the Order of Canada and a celebratory cake was presented in this great honour. We all agreed that it his high time that this award was given to the Professor.

Two new people attended from Louisbourg:
Gary Perry and Bennie Fudge