Andy Coates was our demonstrator for our July meeting and he is another turner that enjoys decorating his work but in a different way to others.

His first piece of the day was to be a bowl with a wide rim to be finished in a way different to what we had seen before. He chose a log of sycamore and set between centres he turned the outside to an ogee form with a chucking spigot. He then reversed it on to a chuck and faced it off with a witness to where he would hollow it later.
For his decoration the face had to be dead flat and when he was happy withy it he spray painted it black, took it off the lathe and carefully placed it in a home made drying box that had a low level light heater inside.

While this was drying he went on to his next project which was to be an urn shaped vase made from a log of spalted silver birch.

Now here’s a thing you can try at home while your neighbours are outdoors having a BBQ . Create your own spalting by leaving the log to soak in a pile of cow poo of the slurry nature. Does wonders for the log, not sure about the BBQ!!

He turned the log to shape with a chucking spigot and then reversed it on to the chuck.
Before hollowing it out he painted the outside with a mixture of vinegar and wire wool. This works especially well with woods that have a high tannin content such as spalted woods.
He applied several coats and finally buffed it with a dry cloth. He started hollowing it with a running centre in place while bringing the wall thickness down leaving a core to support it as far as possible but eventually removing it and finishing the bottom of the inside with a Simon Hope mini hollowing tool. He finally parted it off ready for further decoration such as the pyrographed pieces that he brought in to show us.

These show the sequence of turning the vase, the coating with the vinegar and wire wool liquid and the pyrography decoration you can enhance the piece with.

Andy then returned to his first item. He took it from the drying box and sprayed the painted surface with water to create beads of water and then using a tin of acrylic paint he sprayed across from one side at a low angle, almost horizontal, first with a blue paint and then turned it through 180 degrees and sprayed it with a white paint. This he very carefully lifted it back in to his drying box.

He only uses this drying method at demonstrations. At home he would leave it to dry on the bench so as not to disturb the surface.

On the left is the finished bowl and on the right is a closer look at some samples of the finish that can be achieved. The surface must be flat and also applied with the bowl on a dead level surface or it will run off.

Next Andy turned another interesting little vessel. He mounted a cube of cedar wood between centres but mounted on its corners. He turned a chucking spigot on one end and then turned one half from the points towards the tailstock as you see in the photo. Then he mounted it on the spigot and hollowed it out from the points to bottom. Sanding it could be painful if you miss judge placing your fingers**! These are two that Andy brought in to show us that had been made from scraps glued together. Chris actually bought the one on the left. Who said woodturners don’t buy wood turnings. Well, she’s not actually a wood turner I suppose. Andy’s final piece was a curiosity piece, like, what’s it for? He glued some lumps of wood together, some of it being sacrificial and some hopefully to sell when it’s finished. Mounted on a steel chucking ring he first turned a dish in the centre and then he mounted it off centre and turned another. After sanding it he took it from the lathe and split the pieces apart and was left with a dish and half a dish which was buffed to a shiny finish ready for a curious customer Well, that was our day with Andy and a very enjoyable day it was. Next month is a club day where anything goes and will include a speed turning competition and if you want to know what you will be turning and what the winners prize is you will have to come along and find out. Also Dawn has asked for those very special items you have hidden away to enter in to the SAW competition in October to be brought to the next meeting so that we start putting together a show to beat the rest. We had another successful weekend at Woodlands with only Dawn, Bert , Fred, Chris and myself looking after it. We made Approx £988 which Bert made up to a round £1.000. This will be split between Marie Curie and Blackthorn Trust. Many thanks to everyone who donated items for us to sell. The quality of pieces was very high. We had three items in the raffle, two won by local people who Chris and I delivered them to and one by a lady from Gillingham who came to the charity shop where Chris helps out to collect it. One of the staff named Megan drew the tickets seen below and also below is a photo of our stand with a large selection of pens by Fred. The, at present quiet, raffle stand is shown below with Chris and Dawn was also quite busy at times. We will be back there in November. The pictures are at the end of the July gallery. Fred Graham BACK