More pens and videos

I've been turning some more pens again when I don't have a lot of shop time. I've also been making some videos while in the shop.

One of the recent pens I made was made from purple heart. Purple heart is brown after cutting or sanding, the purple will return on its own with time and exposure to sunlight. But it's possible to speed this process up by heating the wood.

Here the color change is noticeable

It is amazing how quickly the color changes. I have some other ideas I want to try on my next purple heart pen.

I also turned my first antler pen recently. It was difficult to find a piece that was straight enough, I had some difficulty drilling straight through the antler. But the end result was good.

Here are a few of the other pens I've made recently

Hickory pen and pencil set

 While making the above hickory pen I attached a Go Pro camera to my roughing gouge for a interesting perspective.

Birds eye maple

Birds eye maple

Walnut Candle Stick Holder

After I completed the repairs to the lathe tail stock I wanted to try turning something.  I've turned most the bigger pieces of wood in the shop already so I had to go to the barn in search of turnable pieces. I found a piece of walnut I had salvaged from our old house when the power company cut down the tree. I started by making a cylinder and then had to decide what I was going to make. I choose a candle stick holder, not exactly the most useful item but was still something I could learn by making. I cut a tenon on one end so I could attach it to a base.

After I had the stick done I found a piece of wood from the same tree that I attempted to mill into lumber.  I glued the base to the stick and then remounted it all in the lathe to shape the base and apply a finish.

I am going to have to turn a cup to attach to the top that can actually hold a candle because I made the top to narrow to hold a candle stick.

Maple bowl

I had some off cuts from the maple lamination from the Maple Mania project I did last year. I cut a circle from one of them and glue it to my bowl turning glue block. The glue block/bolt assembly can bee seen in the picture below. The finished bowl is 6.5" wide and 1" deep. I finished it with a friction polish.

I really like the colors of the different maple piece.  I am looking forward to making more bowls.

Lathe Repair

Back in December I mentioned how I was having some trouble with the tailstock on the lathe and how I wanted to have it machined to take a Morse taper (MT). I ended up ordering a drill chuck that fits on the lathe and the reamers to cut a No.1 Morse Taper. I also order No.1 MT live center and mandrel saver for turning pens. All the parts finally came in so it was time to make the repairs.

I started by drilling a 3/8" hole in the tailstock, and then used the course and finish reamers to form the Morse taper. The process went good for the most part, with only a few hiccups.

Here is a video I made of the process.

I've used the live center to turn a few items and it work so much better than the dead center. This was not just a repair but an upgrade. As a bonus the drill chuck is allowing me to give bowl turning a try as was seen in my previous post.

Walnut Bowl

I recently bought a drill chuck that will fit on the head and tail stock on my lathe. I bought it in order to make some repairs to the lathe but wanted to try and use it for work holding. I made a glue block using a carriage bolt and some cherry scraps. I then rough cut a circle from a walnut off cut. Then I glued the walnut circle to the cherry glue block. I think chucked the carriage bolt in the drill chuck and turned the walnut into a small bowl. It was my first attempt at a bowl and it came out pretty good. I finished the bowl with a friction polish on the lathe.

part way through the sanding process

The finished bowl

I will get a picture of the carriage bolt glue block when I make the next bowl.

I've delivered the large counter top I had been working on and need to clean up the shop now. We all ended up with the flu and the weather has been miserable so there hasn't been much going on in the shop. The next big project is going to be some book cases for the kid's rooms.

Taxidermy Plaques

A coworker of mine has a side business doing taxidermy, he mainly does deer heads and antlers. A few weeks ago he asked me about making some wooden plaques for him to attach his work onto. He had a few cardboard templates of the shapes he was looking for. I made plywood templates from the cardboard ones so I could use them with the router to trim the final work pieces. This has the possibility to be be something that I batch several of the out at once in the future so the plywood templates were the way to go.

The plywood templates

 I had some hickory on hand to make the two plaques I was starting with.

I had to glue 2 pieces to make a blank wide enough for the Illinois.

With the pieces rough cut I attached the templates to the work pieces with double stick tape and used a flush trim bit to make them match the template.

I routed a ogee profile on the European mount and went with a round over on Illinois Shape plaque.

Both plaques got a coat of Boiled Linseed Oil to richen the color, I will be top coating with shellac in a few days.

Dresser ReFinished

We had a weekend with out plans so that meant I got a lot of shop time.

Friday evening started with a little time to mess around while waiting for my wife and kids to get home. I had saw a video of Chris Pine making a large top and wanted to give it a try. It was fun and the top came out pretty good, the longest spin on it so far is 2 minutes.

Saturday I split my time between a few projects, I took time to mill some hickory for a project, and then worked on the dresser and the counter top.  The counter top needed a little more work to make the sink fit, and after that it was time for more poly.

Hickory Glue up

Starting to see the end of this project

I also started applying shellac to the dresser. On Sunday I put another coat of poly on the counter top and fished the final coats of shellac on the dresser. New knobs and pulls finished off the refinishing and I delivered the dresser to my wife's work yesterday.

The Before

After

It looks good in it's new home.

I plan to get the last coat(s) of poly on the counter this week, finish a few smaller projects, turn a few pens, and then finish the design and start the next big projects. I am going to build some book cases for the kids rooms and a desk for my wife.