Week 552 Wood Working

year 10, Week 30, Day One (week 552)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-07-10 Saturday

90 degrees in the morning, 96 in the afternoon under the awning. High streaky haze with random low puffs, mostly sunny in the morning with the puffs increasing as the day passed. A breeze picked up after the early morning. This weather report was brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

WEEEEEE!!!! It is fun to be able to drive around again. Two weekends without a ride was a royal bother. I spent the first few days listening to any little sound our any feel that was not normal. I think I am now to the point where it is normal for me.

Friday:

I went down to Dania to the Antique shop and the Dania Beach Water Gardens. I stopped at the antique shop first. He had found the box that had my woodworking, so I set up my display. Everything was wrapped nicely. It was like Christmas as I had forgotten what all I had. I ended up with a display we both agreed was nice.
I went to the Dania Beach Water Gardens to drop off the face vase. I missed the owner, so I decided to drop the vase off at the antique shop for "storage." I will pick it up from there later to drop off. I have an agreement with the Antique shop where I can "borrow" my work if I have a show or something. I just have to let him know ahead of time. I don't have that agreement with the Water gardens.


Saturday:
We went yard sailing in the morning. I found a pump style coffee dispenser. I had been looking for one since Christmas. I also found some gifts.
I had gone to a craft show in the area many months ago and there was a really good wood worker. He happened to have a yard sale and we talked a bit. He was selling some extra tools. No, I did not buy any.

The beast, that is pretending to be a cat, really missed me. Mom gives him just enough attention to for him to eat his fill and that is all. He might get it twice a day, but that is it. I will stop and give him attention several times during the day. when he saw me, he knew he would get some happiness. He was quite satisfied with me just being there. He loved the company even when I was ignoring him.

Mom had a greeting card holder. It was a set of curled wires to hold the cards, set in a base. Mom wanted the wires to be cut off so she could labor a bunch of the plants she was afraid she would forget what kind they were. It ended up that there was one she got last year that she has no clue what it was.
My dremmel with a cutting disk did a good job of slicing through the wires. I kept the base as it is brass. I messed up the threads of the screw-in insert, that the wires were brazed to, in my attempt to remove the wire ends. It was well brazed.

Mom had a bunch of screws and screw driver bits in a box. I separated out the bits. Mom put them in a jar.

My first woodworking project was to take my last dress vase start and re-mount it on the lathe. I had to cut a tenon in the base so I could try to hollow it out more.
I then turned it around. It was not quite centered. I tried several tools and they were not working. My brother made me a boring bar and it had a set screw to hold the bits in place. I dashed to get a shorter one as this one stuck out way too much. when I got back, I wondered if forsner bits would fit in the hole. It looked close to the right size. I had to draw the set screw out a little, but the forsner bit went in nicely.
I had also run to the little hardware store to get a shorter set screw for the boring bar as the original one (the one my brother had) stuck out too far. With the new set screw, I was able to work without it scraping on the wood.
I tried the forsner bit with the boring bar. I am working in oak, and it did not want to cut the wood. I would lean into the wood with the bit, and the lathe would start to roll. Another thing was that the vase was not exactly centered for some reason so it was shaking my entire body as I leaned into it.
My lathe is set up so that I have two levers I can release and the wheels will tip up out of the way and the lathe will sit on some blocks attached to the underside of the frame. that was so the lathe could be rolled around easily, but I could set it down solidly. I have not used that since they were added. I simply let it sit on the wheels.
I really needed to drop the wheels so the lathe would not roll. I only went in about half an inch, even going to a smaller bit, before I gave up. Oak does not cut easily and since these are really old forsner bits, they might be dull.

I took out the carving basket but got side track and ended up packing everything away instead.
I did quite a bit of stuff, but accomplished little. I can say, for once I got to work wood today which was better than the past two weeks.

Tomorrow I will work wood again.




year 10, Week 30, Day One (week 552)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-08-10 Sunday

90 degrees, high rippled clouds in the morning, mid level puffs slipped in and some lower, "pregnant" puffs came through. About the time I put the very last things in, some dripping had started. It appears like we are getting a tropical depression. My brother and I sat out and read a while during a gully washer. The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of tourism reminds me to tell you that we never get rain here in South Florida. All we get is Liquid Sunshine.

I stopped at Home Depot for a board. I was after a two by twelve yellow pine board. white pine does not get big enough. I chose one with tight rings with the pith running through it.
While I was there. a four by four attacked me. The only way I could keep it from hitting me was to hold it on my cart along side my selected board. It relaxed only after I paid for both boards.

The beast of the back yard acted very much like a cat. He absorbed all the attention I could give him. Scar face showed up and I gave him some petting too. He is not as scruffy looking, in spite the fact that Mom says she has seen him only once the past week.

I cleared the space in front of the grinder and sharpened my bowl gouges. It had been a long time. What a difference this made. These were the original bowl gouges I got and there is not much fluting left in the gouges, I have worked them down so far.
I got a good shape on the tips and then touched them with the diamond hone to make them that much sharper. That really made a difference in how they cut.

I needed to cut some of the two by twelve into squares. I was looking at what I could use to cut it. Me and hand saws don't get along. My drill kit's batteries were all dead so I could not use the saber saw. I went into the shed and looked around. I missed it twice, but there was the black case that contained a circular saw. I got that out and that solved my problem. I cut four platter blanks.

I found the center of the platter blanks and then drew circles around the edges to show where the corners needed to be cut. The band saw removed the corners of three of them. I had set the fourth to the side as an example of what one starts with when one makes the platters.
I turned one plate. I sort of forgot a couple steps, but did them differently to make it work. I had the very last nib of the platter to remove when it hopped off the lathe. I tried cleaning it up a little more and it hopped off again. I stopped on that one.
I tried turning two others and the tape decided it was not going to hang on. I went though a bunch of tape and it just would not hang on. I decided that was good enough. and set them to the side.

I decided to cut some pieces off the four by four. I used the band saw for that. I carefully held the board well away from the saw and moved it into the blade. It is not the best way to do it, but I got no binding and the cuts were not grossly out of square.
I mounted one piece on the lathe but had the wrong tip on the tail stock. I have a tail stock with many points. I had an open ring I can run a drill through. It did not have a good hold on the end of the wood so when I touched the corners with the bowl gouge, the work hopped off the lathe. I decided that was good enough and ended my day by cleaning up.

Several weeks ago, I worked with one of the club's mentors, showing him my technique on making the platters. He yelled at me for not having sharp tools, and then showed me how to use the tool to get better surfaces. Today was the first time I could really try it out.
When I turn, I usually get "flour" and grit. This time, most of what I got was hay. The sharpened tools and the new technique really made for nice surfaces, even though it was not even because my tool rest needs work, to be made flat and smooth.
I need to replace my sanding disk on my disk sander, so I think I will use it up fixing my tool rest next week.

In all, the day went pretty good. I need to do some work on technique but did get some results today. I got some more wood to play with. I now need to apply myself to make full use of my time to use it up.

Next week, I need to get ready for the turning club meeting. I want several platters made. The way the rings in the platter looks is different if the center is toward the top or bottom. The next platter needs to be opposite than the one I made today so I can have that as an example.
I need to make some platters up, stopping at each stage just in case I run into problems. I will do the demonstration on one platter, but if I run into problems, I will be able to grab a platter at that stage and continue to work.
I want to make something out of one of the chunks of four by four.

I will see what actually happens next weekend.