More Things!

I've been doing a lot in the shop lately, and wanted to keep you all informed. For one, I've got more wands up on Etsy, which is cool. Here's the link to the shop: Septimus' Emporium of Handcrafted Geekery

And here are some pics of what I've been up to:

That's a Tormek T-7 wet sharpening system. It's a beast. I suck really hard at free hand sharpening and the Tormek uses a collection of jigs to make things as easy and repeatable as possible. It has completely revolutionized my turning. Woods that frustrated me to no end before now turn easily. Shapes I couldn't accomplish are now possible. Sharp tools really do make all the difference and a few minutes on the Tormek keeps everything in the shop crazy sharp. It's a big investment, but has been absolutely worth it for me. And this is without even sharpening knives and scissors and all the rest. That will come soon enough, I'm sure.

So here are my tiny brooms. Jenna suggested I make some tiny brooms for Christmas ornaments for friends, and I was originally struggling with them, as you can see. None of them really made me happy.

However, the fourth time was the charm on these. I'm super pleased with it and I learned enough to be able to do more of them, for one, and also to be able to use the same technique on full-size brooms, which I think I'll be trying before too long.

Also, I started trying some face turning. Or hollow form turning. I'm still fuzzy on the terminology, but I'm making cup shaped things. This is how they start. Kind of a rough cylinder.

Then we get to hollowing.

Then you kinda rough shape a goblet thingy out of it, I guess.

And then you take pretty pictures. See how easy that was?


And of course, plenty more wands. But everything I've made is on the Etsy site, so you've already seen it. So there you go! That's what I've been up to recently. So much crafting, it makes your head spin.

Etsy Listings

New Etsy listings are up!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/89727754/wand-poplar-9-78-with-satin-finish

http://www.etsy.com/listing/89727452/wand-alder-10-with-satin-finish

http://www.etsy.com/listing/89721639/wand-lignum-vitae-10-18-natural-finish

More projects!

Just wanted to post up a couple new things I turned out this morning. Two mini-wands and a big wand. The minis are alder scrap I had in the shop and the full-size was a piece of poplar.

The minis are really fun to make, and they always come out looking pretty cute, I think. I'll still have to put a coat of poly on these, but they're already looking pretty neat.

This is the full-sized poplar wand. It has a few dings in it, so it would go as a second if someone wanted to buy it. I was paying more attention to the tools than the wood and caught an edge once or twice. Still a pretty wand, though.

I like this design a lot. Especially the handle and pommel (well what would you call it?) but I'm not super happy with the transition bead. If I do another similar design, I'll rework that for sure.

New lathe and more garage space

So a couple posts back I mentioned that I met a fellow wood turner at the Hogwarts party. We talked about turning and general woodworking all night and he happened to have a full-size lathe in his parents' garage across the street that he was looking to sell. It's a fantastic lathe and it was a great price, so I couldn't say no. I also decided shortly before that to keep my side of the garage as a dedicated shop/home gym. So with that, and the opportunity to buy a full-size lathe and really increase my turning capabilities, we enter the next chapter of my turning experience, I guess.

Also, my dad and I built a ceiling rack for all my spare lumber and sheet stock and moved everything up there on Sunday. Here are some pictures so you can see what I mean.

We used our non-patented-but-probably-should-be ceiling suspension system. I actually did hang off of this one as a test and it's rock solid.

We got a base of sheet stock up there and then lumber on the left and remaining sheet stock on the right. The right side is wide enough to fit full 4'x8' sheet stock, which is obviously cool.

This is an improvement, for sure. The more stuff we get out of the garage and off the floor, the better.

There's the bench and board. Exciting stuff! Most exciting is that everything is still organized and put away where it belongs.

Who's this little guy, though? He looks new.

There it is. Shiny new full-size lathe. I can turn up to 12"x36" pieces on this beast. It has a variable speed control, too, which means less stopping and starting for me. I'll do a full review in a little bit. I think I'm also going to have to re-organize the garage a little more to make more room. This is a pretty tight fit right now, and that's not cool. I need room to stretch out when I'm turning.

Thanks for reading!

WANDS. It's all caps because there are so many.

Okay, here goes. A rundown on all the wands I've made so far. I'm going by memory here and I'm no Ollivander just yet, so bear with me if there's something I've forgotten.

#1 - Maple with English Chestnut stain and no clear coat, ~10" long

#2 - Poplar with satin polyurethane finish and no stain, ~12"

#3 - Maple, semi-gloss polyurethane and no stain, ~12"

#4 - Alder with satin lacquer and no stain, ~12"

#5 - Alder with dark walnut stain and satin polyurethane, ~12"

#6 - Maple with satin polyurethane and no stain, ~12"

#7 - Red oak with english chestnut stain and semi-gloss polyurethane, ~12"

#8 - Alder with english chestnut stain and no polyurethane, ~12"

#9 - Unknown wood (maybe rosewood?) with semi-gloss polyurethane and no stain, ~12"

#10 - Mahogany with semi-gloss polyurethane and no stain, ~13"

#11 - Red oak with red mahogany stain and satin polyurethane, ~12"

#12 - Cedar with red mahogany stain and satin polyurethane, ~10"

#13 - Maple, dark walnut stain and satin polyurethane, ~16"

#14 - White oak with golden oak stain and satin polyurethane, ~10"

#15 - Lignum vitae without any stain or clear coat, ~13"

So there you have it. That's everything that popped out of my brain and onto the lathe in the past few weeks. Hopefully that gives you some idea of the capabilities and design options. I've got plenty more, actually, and new tools and more practice are opening things up even more, but that's going to have to be another post. Thanks for reading and let me know if you have any questions.

Video!

The other day, I took a video of me making a wand, more or less from start to finish. Ish. As close as I could manage before the memory card on my camera pooped out, anyway.

So here's part 1:

And here's part 2, which is all the sanding:

So there you go. Everything you ever wanted to know about using the lathe in all the wrong ways.

The Hogwarty party for which I was making so many wands was a roaring success and I had a ton of fun. Everyone seemed to enjoy the wands and all, which was cool. Here are some pictures of how the basement turned out:

That's the faux fireplace we built around the TV down there. I think it turned out very well.

This is the quidditch set we put together. The broom is one of mine and the little bat is one of mine as well. They did such a great job on the chest!

These are all the wands I'd made as party favors. People really seemed to like them, which was cool. Even got me to talking with a guy whose parents live across the street from the Webbers. He's actually going to school to learn fine woodworking and just finished a couple semesters of turning classes. Awesome stuff!

The bookshelves were one of the easier things we did, but i think they turned out very well. Just wallpaper with some wooden frames around them.

Okay, that's it for now. More pics and everything later on!

Lignum Vitae

So last night I went back to Woodcraft to pick up some more wood for turning. While there, I happened to see a 2x2x24 piece of wood that looked very much like the green wood I turned the other night. It was labeled "Lignum Vitae". It was less expensive than I thought it would be, but still not cheap. I found another piece of the wood that looked exactly like what I had gotten before and took it up to the front and asked the guy what it was. He confirmed that it was indeed lignum vitae. So apparently, that's what I was turning.

The cool part about this is that lignum vitae is kind of an amazing wood. Very tough, strong, and long-lasting stuff. It's naturally very oily so it doesn't dry out or rot, and it was used for important pieces on ships. It was basically the forerunner to modern plastics. Anyway, it's all in the Wikipedia article. The natural qualities of this wood made it incredibly handy stuff. It doesn't need a protective coating, since it's just so naturally tough.

Here's where it gets even cooler. The wood also has sort of mythical history. Merlin's wand was supposed to have been made of lignum vitae. The name means "wood of life" which is also awesome.

So anyway, there you go. The wand I made is even cooler than I thought. I ended up putting some poly on it, but I didn't need to. The stuff is sort of bullet proof, sounds like. So anyway, I'm going to buy more of it and it will become a standard wood in my repertoire. I'll just have to figure out a better way to sand it so it isn't so annoying. I'll keep you posted, of course.

Oh, and here's a full picture of the wand I made, all sanded up and off the lathe, with the ends finished and everything.

Pretty, no? I'm going to work on my pictures, specifically the lighting and background, but I'm pleased with how this one turned out.

Thanks for reading!