Orchard Woodturners February Meeting — Emma Cook

Emma´s first piece was a lidded vase as an entry to hollow forms due to the fact that the lid would be fitted into the form, allowing full access. Emma talked about the evolution of a design, keeping old versions of the same pieces to show how your designs and skills evolve.
Starting with a 3" square and 6" long piece of Sycamore, turned to round keeping the diameter as close to the full 3" as possible, Emma then mounted this in a set of Axminster E Jaws. Discussing the design she intended to make, she showed us variations of the Vase and Lid, including the variations of decoration available.

The blank was parted in two sections, leaving a smaller piece for the inserted lid, with a narrow parting tool to keep the grain separation as close as possible. She mounted the base and started shaping the outside (without reducing the weight of the blank too much) before she started hollowing the inside using the spindle gouge. Before too long the overhang became to much and a change of tool was needed. Emma uses a carbide for most hollowing as she works on a high lathe and she does not need to trail the cut with carbide. Working with a good size handle on a Hope carbide cutter she removed a lot of the wood with the smaller 6mm cutter. Due to a few ripples on the surface she moved to a bigger carbide cutter to even out the rough spots.
A parting tool was used to define the recess for the lid to fit into before reversing the piece carefully onto the jaws to refine and remove the bottom and chuck point. A foot was carefully added to the vase to ensure that the curve continued to flow. The outside was then sanded to a finish using a rotary sander.

After finishing, Emma talked about the lid options and showed a variation where the lid could be used either way up, with or without a finial. The remaining part of the blank was trimmed to fit into the recess with a "good" not tight fit. One side of the lid blank was then turned with a concave curve and a finial hold prepared with a Forstner bit. Texture was applied to the bottom at 700rpm and pressing the tool hard against the end grain (The Hope tool compresses rather than cuts). This texture was then painted black using coloured Gesso. The lid was then reversed into a jam chuck and the top (or bottom) turned to expose the through hold, tidied, left plain and finished. With the turning finished, the painted & textured side of the lid was dry brushed with iridescent paint from Joe Sonja. The second piece is an bowl made from an Ash blank that was mounted on the lathe and a waste tenon cut into the blank. This could then be mounted in the chuck and the true base of the bowl cut. The bowl shape was formed using a standard grind bowl gouge then sanded from 120 through to 400. A band was marked out around the edge of the bowl and then textured around the rim, before being outlined with two fairly deep grooves and then finished (leaving the textured area uncoated.

The piece is then reversed and hollowed using a bowl gouge. Emma talked about the importance of bevel angles, particularly for the transition from side to base and how to avoid Pimples and Dimples. Once completed the textured part of the bowl is then given a thin coat of the black Gesso ensuring that it doesn’t fill the texture. This was then given a coat of Acrylic size which was then left to reach tack point (around 15m for this size) After it reached Tack point, Emma´s Chameleon flakes were applied to the surface with a makeup brush.

Once completed, the edges of the textured area had leather cords glued into the grooves (using Fabri-Tac glue) to outline the textured area.

The next piece was a Dragon Egg turned from a 3" by 6" piece of Sycamore although Emma said it should have been closer to 4" to be a better scale. This was turned between centres to round and a chuck point added to each end then the piece separated. The bottom third of the egg is left in the chuck as spigot defined and the egg base hollowed out.

The top is then mounted in the chuck and a jam fit created to mount the bottom of the egg onto the top to be finished. This allows the base of the egg to be turned with the top and the curve to betaken through the whole shape. Once the outside is refined the rest of the egg is hollowed before being sanded and parted off.

For decoration a coloured base coat of Magenta and Orange pearlescent paint was added using a spray to create a graded colour change. Once this was dry a layer of "Daćor Crackle" was added to create a sandwich layer of clear glaze, ensuring the egg was quickly covered in a fairly thick coat. This was allowed to dry fully. After this a colour coat was applied (A deep purple) which began to crackle due to the Daćor crackle layer, but this really increased dramatically when the final layer of Crackle Medium was painted over the top of the egg. The inside was painted with Jo Sonja paint and then the Pink Ethereal dust was applied.

The next piece was to show paints on a platter, using a basic pre-turned blank which Emma cleaned off to create a flat surface to work on. The piece was covered in black lacquer then dried. An iridescent paint in various colours was painted thickly along the inside of the platter around the centre core, before masking the lathe with a cardboard box and spinning the piece at 2500 rpm. Once dry the same was done with acrylic size to create a radial pattern of glue. This dried to tack point before a mixture of iridescent flakes and the ethereal powder was applied to the glue. Once this was all dry the centre was removed to frame the decoration.

In the final 15 minutes of the day, Emma shoed how to use transfer sheets and stencils on a cylinder with jo Sonja paints.

Overall another cracking demo from the Tiny Turner.

March meeting will be a club day so the usual applies. See you there

Paul