Club Meeting: 25th June 27, 2025
Report by: Bob Yandell

Our Club is fortunate in having people willing to share their knowledge and an environment that encourages members o ask if they don’t know – There are no dumb questions.

Kieran Fitzgerald was Chairperson and Timekeeper and having received questions, in advance, had passed them to the 2 principal experts Terry Scott and Ian Connelly for them to be prepared. It looked like Terry had brought his workshop minus lathe and bandsaw.

The following are synopsis of the questions posed and of the advice given by the experts and relevant comment from those attending. Many of he answers can also be found on our website under Tips and Jigs.

Chuck size – use appropriate jaws especially for bowls and platters greater than 300mm diameter use of 100 or 75mm jaws achieve a safer result. The opening of the jaws widely to accommodate a larger spigot is not appropriate as it results in 8-point contact, this can result in the spigot being torn off, whereas near total contact is achieved when correctly used. After the item is finished the spigot can be removed or modified, such as transformed into feet.
Chuck – Mounting Safely

Finishes – Key to choice is “What is the purpose is the item”. There is no one Finish for all items. Avoid waxes when the item is for food or will be handled many times e.g. lid in a much-used box. Hard oils such as Danish should be applies in warmer temperatures thus ensuring they dry. Humidity and temperature affect drying time. First coat to be light/thin as it is the one that acts as a key to subsequent coats and best left 24 hours. If applying a spray, the first should be a mist coat as it is again going to be the key to following coats.

Inlays – To fill a void and enhance the look of an item you can use powders such as copper and turquoise. The void should be clean and to reduce the amount of powder used spray the surface with Accelerator the fill with sanding dust to a level below the finished surface. On a curve you may need to build a dam using hotmelt glue. Put in the powder higher in the centre of the void and tap it down, like the dentist doing a filling, apply CA glue (Thin) but no accelerator. Continue until proud of the surface. Tip – Store your powder in a bottle, like that used for CA glue as this will assist in minimising the amount of powder applied. Sand the filled void area with care as the inlay is harder than the wood.

Fingernail And Other Grinds – The choice of grind angle is a personal decision and changing the angle to follow a particular turner won’t solve a problem. The basic principle of rubbing the bevel, angle of the flute and speed, both across the wood and of the lathe must be first and foremost in the process.

Terry’s Fingernail grind starts with the standard 55 grind then by moving the leg of the Woodcut Tru-Grind holder from the parallel to notch 4 and grind the back from the tip.
Go to the links on our website
Sharpening – Other Grinds
Sharpening Process
Sharpening Settings
Sharpening Spacers
Sharpening Station

Gauge the thickness at the base of a Hollow form – Terry showed various ways to measure the wall thickness and base. They were the manufactured, the self-made (using wire coat hanger, wood and dowels, laser light). Too many and too difficult to write about, see Terry!

What makes a good Knob or Finial – The basic rule of thirds or Golden Ratio or Fibonacci sequence (0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13…), where the ratio of consecutive numbers approaches the Golden Ratio.  The design of the Finial or Knob must not be considered alone but as part of the total image. It is part rather than an add on, it is complimentary. Reference Cindy Drozda (www.cindydrozda.com).

Making a Walking stick – This was explained by Peter Wyatt. Peter has 3 basic sources for the shaft – Old and damaged sticks from Op Shops; square wood 40 x 40 x ?? and Teatree (Manuka) of a diameter suitable. People love the twists and curves. Handles are also from various sources – door handles/knobs; deer antler; golf putters etc. A 7mm hole is drilled in one end of the staff/shaft to a depth of 38mm and a 7mm hole is drilled into the handle to a depth approaching 38mm, subject to material. A 6mm galvanized rod is cut to 75mm and inserted in the staff and glued in place with 2-part epoxy and the handle is also secured with epoxy. Variance in diameter 6mm rod and 7mm hole accommodates alignment. If a Ferrel is required it cut from tubing (Copper, Brass or Stainless Steel. Turning the staff/Shaft requires 2 steadies and the end thirds are turned first.

Paper Joints – This is the method whereby pieces of wood can be joined using PVA before turning and then separated, by a chisel at end grain, before rejoined so the turned profile is now the internal part of the project. The paper of preference is newspaper because of its construction.

A successful event and a future such event may see the remaining questions answered.

Club Meeting: 18 June 2025
Report by: Ian Connelly

The demo started in only a way that it would start with Mr Veitch, where he started by talking about cleaning the lathe bed, do not use oil on the bed it attracts dust, use dri-glide or wax. First clean the bed with 0000 steel wool, then apply the product and spread it over the lathe bed. With wax leave it for a short time and buff the surplus off.

Several years back Dick attended a demo in the USA that showed the emphasised the use of the grain in the wood to look wonderful in every way. Rather than colouring, texturing and other ways to try and make work stand out.

Dicks first piece of wood was a graft from an apple tree, he mounted it on a screw chuck, with the tailstock up.

He then cut a bowl profile using draw cuts, removed the tailstock support and cleaned up the bottom of the bowl.

After examining the bottom Dick declared it to be a bit sappy, so took some more off and reformed a spigot.

He the formed an ogee at the bottom of the bowl to give it more “lift”.

With a couple more cuts, refining the shape it revealed the beautiful grain that had formed around the graft.

Dick then talked about a couple of blanks he had, and questioned how to make the most of the woods features.

A piece of juniper he had, was ideal as a box blank, but with the contrast of sap wood and heart what would make a suitable lid?

A large flat piece of swamp kauri had another piece of wood glued to it to use as a spigot to maximise the use of the available timber.

An important point was if you are planning to carve or pyrography a piece then you need to design the piece with that in mind. Embellishment should not be tacked on, in need to be part of the piece.

Then Dick took two pieces of fir and turned one with the grain cupping up, the other with it cupping down to show the contrast in grain patterns.

As always an interesting and thought provoking demo for Dick.

Club Meeting: 4 June 2025
Report by: Ian Connelly with help of Julies Notes

Julie started by introducing herself as a member of North Shore Woodturners Guild and the treasurer of NAW, then suggested that she was not here to do a “Trefor” and sell everybody on why they need to be memebrs of NAW.

She then talked about Leith Gray. Leith had been a teacher and after he retired he built a large home that had the most enormous workshop she had seen. It appeared that the home was designed around the workshop. All along one wall were deep bays like oversized pantry and each one had a different focus, he had 3 lathes, 4 grinders and most other woodworking tools. One wall had 1m deep shelving full of wood and wet turnings.

Leith was a great wood collector, with many varieties in storage. He also made many of his own tools out of surgical steel, planner or bandsaw blades, screwdrivers, and small tools from concrete nails.

Julie met Leith at the Taupo Jamboree where he was making rattles with double captive rings.

Unfortunately Leith passed away last year, there is a video of him making captive rings on the NAW youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/@naw-org-nz

Julie had other examples of Leith’s work such as helixes cut on a scroll saw, he taught Bruce Wood how to make these. He also made tiny captive rings on finials. It was suggested to follow Leith’s lead and make a number of finials for reference, then when you want one for a box you work out what suits best from these.

Making a Rattle

First you need the right wood, the best is cherry, heart wood from the trunk of the tree. This is the most stable and should give good results.

Rough turn – wax the ends and store until it dries.

Need sharp tools, a disk mounted on the lathe with 1000 grit sandpaper, or on a flat sheet of glass enables the ability to create a finely sharpened tool.

Mount the wood in a chuck, supported by a live centre and round it.

Mark out the rattle, using a story stick.

Use a thin parting tool to defined the rings.

Round over the top of the rings with a spindle gouge.

Then use the custom tool to clean the top of the ring, then sand the top of the ring.

Next another custom tools is used to cut the sides, cutting one side at a time. The tool was blunt on the bit that touches the front side of the ring.

Use a parting tool to create more clearance under the rings, this was then cleaned up with a small custom skew chisel.

Julie then couldn’t help but sneek in another ring under the first rings, after stating she was going to keep it simple for the demo.

The bottom of the rings can be cleaned with a stanley knife that has a carpet hook blade. (ring size matched the blade, also the ring tools had been made with the help of a chainsaw file)

The easiest method for sanding the back of the rings is a long piece of cloth backs sandpaper held at one end with clamp or other device threaded though the ring allowing the ring to be move back and forth with paper conforming to the rings shape.

Just for good measure Julie then used the waste block still in the chuck to turn a finger top, a thing NSWG encourages members to do to add to the gifts they donate at the end of the year to multiple charities they support.

A great demo from Julie, with so much information that it was bewildering where to stop in the write up. A very enjoyable night at the club. Now go off and watch Julie’s video of Leith doing a demo of his rings. https://youtu.be/t6WNqBW0Qdc

Club demo: 28 May 2025

Report by: Kevin McFall

Kieran’s demo of a lidded spoon was a fun demo filled with spoonerisms and heckling encouraged. There was plenty of both!

The Spoon Bowl

Kieran started with a blank 50 x 55 and approx. 150mm long. For the demo this had been pre-prepared with a 20 x 50 piece cut out of it and a waste block of the same size glued in place.
The piece cut out was then glued to another waste block for turning the lid, alignment of the grain needs to be considered here.

The piece that was to be the spoon was then marked out to get the centres. At the end with the waste glued on the centre is marked on the core piece ignoring the waste piece, the other end is marked to exclude the same area as the waste at the opposite end and then marked up.

With what was to be the spherical spoon end in the chuck, Kieran bought up the tailstock and rounded to a blank cylinder (at approx 1750rpm) and added a spigot at the tailstock end. The finished diameter of the cylinder is 47mm.

Removing the blank and mounting it in the chuck he turned a sphere for the outside of the spoon bowl.

This sphere can be mathematically calculated, but in this case, Kieran used Soren Berger designed sphere calliper which does these proportions for cutting away corners to get a rough sphere. Once these are done the rough sphere is then machined to a nice sphere by eye, although using a piece of pipe can assist by rubbing it on the rotating sphere to highlight high spots, and sanded this to a nice finish.

Kieran then bought up the tailstock and used a chuck cub (a pre-turned cylinder of wood with a semi spherical cutout at one end that goes between the sphere and the tailstock to prevent damage to the sphere while between centres) between the sphere and the tailstock.

Kieran then turned the handle with some beads at the spoon end and 3 lines darkened with wire to embellish the handle. This was then sanded and parted off.

This piece was then put into a larger chuck with the glued waste block section exposed and the handle protruding through the gap in the jaws.

A piece of cut cardboard tube with a slit in it was placed around the sphere to protect from jaw damage.

The waste block was then turned off and the bowl of the spoon hollowed out. It is noted that care should be taken to not catch your arm on the spinning handle whilst doing this part of the spoon, as it is moving rapidly in close proximity. Kieran also removed his watch for this.

When hollowing out ensure you leave room for the lip for the lid to lock into and then cut this lip. The inside was then sanded.

The Spoon Lid

The other block that had the piece cut out of the spoon blank and glued to the waste block was then put into the chuck with the glued spoon blank piece exposed.

Kieran turned the wood round, faced it off. He then measured the spoon and turned a tenon to fit and hollowed out the lid of the box, regularly stopping the lathe and testing the fit of the spoon to the lid.

Kieran then shaped the top and parted it off. The then made a jam chuck from the remaining waste block to complete the top of the lid. After the lid flew across the room some hot glue was used to help secure it on the jam chuck! This was checked regularly with the spoon to ensure the spherical shapes match as closely as possible.

Kieran did a great demo filled with useful information and completed with his entertaining and humorous style!

Club Meeting: 9 April 2025
Report by: Ian Connelly

Jon Pearse and Kieran Fitzgerald teamed up to do a demo.

The guys had set up two lathes in the demo area. There was a little explanation of what they were going to do, where one would explain a process/project and the other would turn while waiting for his opportunity to talk.

Kieran started making a treen – a small wooden object for domestic use.

Jon then had a chance to talk, he was making a bowl. First you need to inspect your wood looking for defects.

He then discussed the screw chuck – reminding us to make the hole deep enough. The voyager drill press in the club can assist with this – zero the bit on the wood then watch the screen as you drill down to 20mm.

Cutting off the corners of the blank can assist with turning.

Then tenons, faceplates, tek screws. If the wood wants to run away when screwing the tek screws in clamp it between the banjo and the tailstock.

Kieran then had a turn to discuss his project.

Board 15mm thick

Hot melt glue chuck used to maximise use of timber.

Faced off the piece and made a recess for the 100mm chuck, only 1-2mm deep. Standard jaws have a bevel – this can be ground off the make a sharper edge to grip better.

Kieran made an ogee curve on the outside – divid the length into thirds to assist with this shape.

The treen was then reverse onto the recess mount, faced off…..

Jon then stepped in and talked about sanding – where he finds as you go up the grits, do one grit with the power sander and the next by hand.

Kieran then did a short demo of using spirit based dyes, lighting the meths to flash off the dye before adding another colour, sanding, more dye, more fire…..

The demo was a little erratic making the report quite challenging, but a very entertaining night was had by all, great job guys.

Club Meeting: 7 May 2025
Report by: Ian Connelly

Discussion started talking about the best wood to use. Glenn said he tried this process with wet wood, the issue was it was hard to drill and the hole closed up.

Dry wood, with straight grain seems to give better results, Glenn started with a black 40x40x300 mounted between centres.

He rounded this roughly, then mounted it is a chuck, ensuring it was centered by bringing up the tailstock.

He did a little bit of a tidy up of the rounding with the skew.

There was quite a discussion between Glenn and the audience about the process of drilling out the pipe and trying to stay on centre.

A summary of the discussion: Past experience of people that had made single piece pens suggest that hand holding the drill is often better that using a jacobs chuck and take it many small increments to make sure that the swarf does not build up and drive the drill off course.

Glenn used a long drill in a jacobs chuck to drill the pipe, after swapping out a bent drill for a nice new straight one (always great to have a backup plan for a demo)

A pop rivet shell was then places in the hole, so that tailstock support could be restored without splitting the wood.

Glenn progressively turned the pipe down to approx 10mm.

Then it was time for a little more work on the cup – Glenn drilled the cup out with a 20mm forstner.

Then there was a check done to make sure that the hole in the cup and the hole in the pipe met – success!

Next Glenn cut off much of the excess around the cup with the bandsaw, the remainder is then carved away using a dremel.

To bend the pipe, a wire is inserted down the hole to prevent it closing and the pipe was simmered for 30 minutes in water in a frypan. It was then clamped in a jig and allowed to cool.

A great demo of something different, thanks Glenn.

Club Meeting: 30 April 2025
Report by: Janet McDonald

This demonstrations theme was “Added Value”. Denise Donovan the demonstrator accomplished this by taking the basic turned box formula and adding a wrist bracelet as part of the boxes construction.

At the lower opening area of the box she turned a bracelet from the boxes edge. This making the bracelet removable from the box, when the lid was removed from the finished box.

She shaped the outer box profile to the same contours of the bracelet so when the box was closed you could not tell it was a bracelet, but just part of the overall box design shape.

Club Meeting: 2 April 2025
Report by: Ian Connelly

Dave started by discussing how he dissects a log to get a bowl blank. His preference is timber that is under compression as this gives the best figure. Such timber is found below branches, or in the root area of the tree.

He then mounted a piece of magnolia on a screw chuck, and bought up the tailstock for additional support. He pointed out that having the tailstock up when you can adds to the stability and safety.

He then showed roughing the blank down with the bowl gouge having bevel contact with the wood. Directing your weight down into the toolrest to prevent the tool jumping.

Another techinque he demonstrated was using the chisel with the bevel fully open, taking small cuts and controlling the depth with the forward hand against the toolrest.

As the blank becomes more round and balanced you can increase the lathe speed.

Always mark the centre of your spigot with the skew, using the tailstock on wet wood can result in you mark closing back up.

Dave then presented the option of gluing on a spigot. This can be a handy technique if you want to use the full depth of wood. He used an offcut from his spindle work (pays to keep these for this or jam chucks etc). Using “Jimmy’s glue” he wet both surfaces before applying the glue then clamped the joint in the lathe for 4 minutes, can turn this particular glue in 30 minutes.

Dave then talked about faceplate turning, and pointed out to try not to get multiple screws in line on the grain, as this can lead to a spilt.

He then showed another bowl with a spigot within a bigger recess. This can help simplify the final finishing of the bowl as you can just remove the spigot without having to put as much thought into the shape of the base as this is already formed around the recess.

Dave showed the process of reversing a bowl using the reversing mandrel in the tailstock. This allowed the second chuck to be better aligned to the already turned outside of the bowl.

Dave proceeded to hollow the bowl with tailstock support, leaving a cylinder in the centre, which he then cleaned up. This process reduced the stress on the spigot and allowed him to potentially take bigger cuts.

There was a high spot in the middle of the bowl, Dave showed using shading of a pencil the process of cleaning up this high spot progressively until all the pencil was removed.

The demo was an interesting journey through a number of different ideas and approaches to something that many of us take for granted. It reinforced that there are many ways to approach turning a bowl while still doing it safely. Thanks Dave.

Club Meeting: 26 March 2025
Report By Cory Wyatt.

Kerry has been a member of the North Shore Woodturners Guild for 30 years and has developed from turning to many other facets of wood work including making many many boxes with marquetry.

So, what is Marquetry? Google states that Marquetry is the art and craft of applying pieces of veneer to a structure to form decorative patterns or designs.

The Process:

You start with a drawing that you want to make. This is called a Cartoon, this is then transferred to tracing or baking paper.

You next choose your wood, were contrasting colours make the over all image pop. Using tape (you use a lot of tape so have plenty before starting) create a hinge on with the traced image, wood to be cut and a piece of waste wood. Mind the patterns on the wood, burls and grains can be used to develop the image.

The cut the pattern out on the scroll saw. Use tape as needed to stop the wood fluffing. You can complete the same steps over and over and double up on layers of veneer to ensure you pieces match with only a small curf. The curf is the space cut by the blade and explains the small gaps between different pieces.

To cut inner shapes use a small drill bit to cut a whole just bigger than the blade (0.6-0.7mm) and thread the blade through and cut as normal. Here is where a non-pinned blade is easier as a smaller hole is needed for the blade as no pin is present. When drilling, only drill 4-5 holes at once, as they can fill with dust causing issues later.

When all the pieces are ready and taped up turn over and cover in PVA (Tight bond) glue and place on the backing board. Place a small piece of foam and a board and clamp together. Baking paper can be used to ensure the foam does not stick. The foam limits the damage to the veneers.

After 24 hours peel and sand, be careful as the veneer depth is about 0.7mm. Finish as you see fit.

For discussion on pinned vs Pinless blades here is a highly rated Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suvhnj1yx80

Club Meeting: 19 March 2025
Report by: Bill Alden

Dick opened with some Do’s and Dont’s of Box Making

• Don’t put a thread on a box except for small pill boxes or a needle case.
• Don’t make it too big consider hand size.
• Pop fit is not encouraged as it takes 2 hands to open.
• You may use a finial as a handle.
• If it is wider than it is tall use cross grain wood. If taller than wide End grain is better.

Dick then showed us a dozen or so boxes from his collection made by various people in the club and overseas visitors.

Butterfly Box

He started with the block pushed firmly against the chuck jaws with the tail stock and cut a 46mm spigot on one end.

After reversing it into the chuck it was rounded down to the outside diameter of 75mm which will allow a 65mm internal diameter for a butterfly box.

Make the final cut slowly with a freshly sharpened 10mm bowl gouge. He then cut a 46mm spigot on the bottom.

Then he measured for a 20mm deep hollow on the inside. Before the final parting off of the lid a 2mm parting cut was made on the lid end to the correct size to fit into the neck of the box

Then mount the lid in the chuck and cut a curve on the inside of the lid, finish and polish.

Dick showed two methods of hollowing the box

Method 1

Put base back on the chuck and hollow to a width of 65mm with a 55 degree bowl gouge to a depth of 20mm, using a flat scraper or a skew chisel to flatten the bottom.

Bring up the lid and sand the outside with lid attached and finish, tape on the lid and finish the top.

Method 2

Follow the same procedure up to *

This piece was done with a 65mm Forstner bit, tip keep the bit moving.

Dick then used the Soren Berger hollowing tool which is designed to cut a flat bottom on the box. With the tool horizontal draw from the centre hole to the outside.

Finial

Dick then showed us a basic finial. Tips: Do not use the tailstock as the pressure will break it start with the top “onion” and work down the elements do not go back finish each element as you go.

Keep plenty of meat at the chuck end.

Use close grained hard wood. Hairy wood will not make a good finial and will be difficult to finish.

Thank you Dick for another informative Demonstration.

Box, Butterfly #1
Box, Butterfly #2
Box, Butterfly #3
Box, Butterfly #4