Watcha doing?

[Cloudwalker]

Today in our church service we dedicated our newly remodeled sanctuary building.  The DS was there, and preached, and our handbells played.

[tango]

I finally ran over my floor with the orbital sander. There are a couple of places where the wood grain is at a weird angle and pretty much anything - the vacuum cleaner, the sander, whatever - will catch and tear. So I used a Stanley knife to cut away the damaged parts, and I'll probably use a paste of lacquer and sawdust to fill the gaps and keep the damaged edges under control. Then I ran the shop vac to get the worst of the sawdust and shavings up, and a damp cloth to get the rest of it. I'll probably run the damp cloth over it again to make sure I've cleared it all before I get busy with the lacquer.

Tomorrow is supposed to be reasonably warm, so maybe I can lacquer tomorrow and run the fan during the day. At least that will reduce the amount of vapor that gets into the house. The last coat will have to be right before bed and the nights are still cold enough that I'd want the fan out before the final coat, but anything is a bonus.

[tango]

I didn't finish the floor, I got sidetracked by my lathe. I manhandled the stand into place and got my wife to lift the lighter end of the lathe onto the stand. The thing is five feet long and weighs 150lb so lifting it myself seemed like a good way to max out the deductible on my health insurance. So I lifted the heavier end and she took the light end, and I got it fired up.

The first attempt yielded mixed results and much learning. The wood kept stalling even when I was taking very light cuts. I thought the motor was strong enough to handle it, and indeed it was, it turned out I hadn't cranked the tailstock into the wood aggressively enough, so the motor was still turning but the spur drive was spinning rather than driving the wood. Cranking the tailstock more aggressively solved the problem and I could cut more aggressively.

The second attempt was slightly more ambitious, cutting coves into a piece of wood. It turned out kinda sorta OK. The guy who gave me the lathe said he was struggling to get a good finish with it, but based on the finish I was getting using entry level cutting tools and a piece of construction grade lumber I'm wondering if he just wanted an excuse to get rid of a surplus lathe or if I'm missing something. I'm not getting a shiny finish by any means, but I wouldn't expect a shiny finish when I'm starting with construction grade lumber.

Anyway, the lathe is set up and working, I'm enjoying turning wood into sawdust, and my floor is still awaiting some final attention. Having the lathe working means I can turn some decorative corner pieces - that not only looks pretty but also means I don't have to figure funky angles and cutting baseboards so they fit neatly into each other.

[RabbiKnife]

As the good book says (popular mechanics, that is)

“Caulk covereth a multitude of sins.”

[tango]

As the good book says (popular mechanics, that is)

“Caulk covereth a multitude of sins.”

Caulk covers a lot of things, but stained wood doesn't always work well with it. It's great if baseboards are painted white but mine aren't.... they are wide boards that are stained and lacquered. Caulking would stand out like a sore thumb, probably more so than a slightly mismatched joint.

In unrelated news I turned some more wood into sawdust last night, tinkering with how my lathe tools work, cutting angles, how to hold them against the wood etc. I'm getting there, slowly but surely.

[RabbiKnife]

Well, the good news is that if your klutzy non-graceful self is going to slip on the ice in the parking deck at DeKalb County courthouse at 9:00 am before a 4 hour mediation and you land on his your elbow and break your arm, a nondisplaced fracture of the radial head about an inch below the actual elbow joint is the easiest to treat and heal without surgery or a cast with just an ace bandage and Tylenol

On the other hand, the bad news is…

Just sayin’…

[tango]

... and presumably your four hour mediation gets rescheduled to when the lawyer hasn't broken himself?

I hope you recover quickly. I'm assuming your post wasn't purely hypothetical...

[RabbiKnife]

We finished the mediation before I went to the doctor

And no, not a hypothetical

Healing up well

No cast
Compression bandage
Ice
Rest

[teddyv]

Well, the good news is that if your klutzy non-graceful self is going to slip on the ice in the parking deck at DeKalb County courthouse at 9:00 am before a 4 hour mediation and you land on his your elbow and break your arm, a nondisplaced fracture of the radial head about an inch below the actual elbow joint is the easiest to treat and heal without surgery or a cast with just an ace bandage and Tylenol

On the other hand, the bad news is…

Just sayin’…

Our health and safety officer went down on some ice getting out of a truck. Shook it off, but woke in a lot of pain. Turns out he fractured a rib and punctured a lung. One surgery so far, maybe another yet.

[tango]

Fun With Lathes today.

It was cold this morning so I started to fiddle with my lathe, and ended up turning a snowman out of an old piece of wall stud. My wife loved it, so I put some wood oil on it to bring out the character of the wood and then went for a run. Then I turned another snowman for my daughter. I kinda like the way the snowmen look, the wood I used is over 100 years old and has a glorious grain to it.

[tango]

I got to surprise my daughter today. She said how much she loved the snowman I made for my wife, so at church this morning I presented her with a snowman of her own.

I also found out that I've been using my skew chisel incorrectly. I've been using it more as a scraper than a cutter, which isn't the best way to use it and doesn't produce the best finish. So I set up a couple more pieces of wood and fiddled with the skew chisels to see how well they worked out. The difference was remarkable. What was very pleasing was seeing some sections of ribbon-like shavings coming off the wood. The Youtube videos I've been watching show people cutting with huge great ribbons of wood flying off their skew, but I haven't reached that stage just yet. But it's good to have short sections of ribbon forming, it shows my form is improving. It was also nice to see a couple of scrap pieces I experimented with end up with a near perfectly smooth finish without any sanding at all. I'm slightly puzzled, the guy who gave me the lathe said he couldn't get a good finish on it, but I seem to be getting a good finish with hardly any experience and with entry level tools sharpened with a belt sander because that's what I have available.

Now I need to figure out how to use the new 4-jaw chuck I bought. I struggled with it, wasn't sure if it was properly rounded, and took it off again. Before returning it I figured I'd spend some time on Google to see if I was doing something wrong, and it appears I might have been. I can't be sure, so some more research is required.

A bucket that once contained 20lb of cement powder is now full of wood shavings. I'm not yet sure what I'm going to do with the wood shavings. The fact they burn gives me one option, if I can't find any better uses for them.

[tango]

Today I tried making some smaller snowmen. I turned out three of them, the tallest of which was about two inches high. I had thought I might share them among family members but my wife claimed them all. So my daughter got a photo. Maybe I'll turn out some more, I want to figure how to hold small pieces in a chuck so I can lose the tailstock but don't yet know what options might be out there.

[tango]

More fun with the lathe, as well as some fun with the snow.

Tinkering some more with the skew, and now I'm getting better finishes even if I sometimes manage to catch the skew. I know in theory what causes it but don't always manage to avoid the situation.

Then I tried to make a small bowl out of a piece of 2x4. It kinds sorta worked, for a first effort I guess it's OK but I'm aware of shortcomings with it. I should probably buy myself a bowl gouge so I can do that sort of thing without making such a hash of it.

I also turned a spinning top. I'll probably make another one, so my youngest granddaughters don't have to fight over this one.

[ProDeo]

My wife and I are recovering from a nasty flu, 10 days and counting.

[RabbiKnife]

Yikes!!!!!