8 Sept 2020 – Workshop Activity Night

A great evening providing entertainment for our members whilst we are still in restricted conditions due to the virus. We opened the meeting with a quick housekeeping and guide on how to use the chat facility, either sending out messages to ‘everyone’ or a ‘private’ message to an individual. As a club we are trying to encourage members to get to know each other and are going to trial a ‘Meet the Club Member’ section where we can learn how we all got into woodturning and who and what inspires us. I started us off this week followed by a few of our better-known members to get the ball rolling.

Terry Smart, a long-standing friend of the Club dropped into the meeting offering to do a question and answer session about his Company Chestnut products. We had a lot of questions from both experienced and new turners; ranging from sanding sealers to spirit stains and I am sure all learned a lot. Terry explained in great detail the health and safety issues and also the best way to use each and every item we sought advice on. We were all invited to join in with the Conkers presentations and also the weekly newsletter. All details can be found at  https://chestnutproducts.co.uk/. A reminder to you all that on our Download page we have 28 of the Finishing School leaflets and on our Chestnut Products page there are links to 6 of their videos to give you something to watch. A big thank you to Terry for his time and expertise.

Having experts from various companies has been a real bonus during our online workshop meetings this would be difficult to arrange within the club hall, with all the travel and time constraints; it also allows us to understand a lot more about the products we use and where they come from. Craig from Record Power is next workshop guest.

We had a good offering from our show and tell section with several members presenting their successes and one or two slip ups, however, there is always a way to salvage and recover from disaster and someone to offer a solution; let’s keep it up.

Geoff, our previous Chairman showed a different material used on his box as shown below. It is Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel (UTEE). It is available as a clear material to which you can add embossing powder available in various colours or you can use coloured UTEE. Geoff used gold UTEE and when it had melted he added a small amount of black embossing powder to create the swirl effect. When cutting the recess in the lid just make sure you undercut the rim. When pouring the melted UTEE into the recess it is important your lid is perfectly level. The melting pot shown is no longer imported into the UK, but they are available from various sites on Ebay. You can however keep it simple by using a small foil container used for mince pies (eat the mince pie first) and a heat gun to melt the UTEE. Melt Art UTEE is available from many craft suppliers. The nearest embossing powder to Puter is Silver Dollar from Sweet Dixie.

We are considering a closed group on Facebook so that members can put their offerings online for us to look at. Several members already use Instagram, but this group could be another avenue to show your work. We have a great wealth of talent in the club and our aim is to promote the art of Woodturning amongst Woodturners and the general public.

For your diaries: Following the success of or previous demonstrators online, Chris Parker, Pat Carroll and Richard Findley which have all been very well received we are looking forward to 29th September IRD with Stewart Furini, more news to follow.