22 Nov 2022 – Richard Findley Demo

Tuesday 22nd November and our last online IRD this year with Richard Findley, Richard from Leicestershire who worked for his father as a qualified joiner before pursuing a career as a full-time turner has demonstrated for us before both live at the club and one of both his and our first IRD’s during lockdown, so we welcomed him back to our club.

Richard introduced himself and explained, for the benefit of our new members, how he got into professional turning before showing the item he intended to demonstrate for us. A small, lidded bowl/box with finial and a surprise teardrop inside. Sapele and Sycamore were his chosen timbers.

Both had been predrilled for mounting on a screw chuck. The bowl was mounted first and a tenon formed. Mounting the blank Richard explained the differences between end grain and cross grain when turning bowls and the benefits of both.

Throughout the evening Richard explained in great detail his choice of tools and the reasons for using them for each process along with push and pull cuts, sheer cuts, and sanding technique to obtain best results. The bowl would be turned to a thickness of 8mm allowing for a recess to seat the lid into. An interesting tip at this point was to use the Sycamore blank as a ram chuck to remove the tenon from the bowl. The top of the box in contrasting white Sycamore to the dark Sapele base mounted onto the screw chuck to commence shaping a gentle curve. Richard took great care in obtaining a good finish to the surfaces so that minimal sanding required.

Finally, a small Sapele blank was mounted in the jaws with tailstock support to turn the finial that doubles up as the knob to remove the lid, another useful tip here, the small teardrop finial inside the lid has a small tenon which when mounted through the lid goes into a receiving hole drilled into the top finial, ingenious design.

Throughout the whole evening Richard shared his knowledge of tools and their presentation to the work and other time and labour-saving ideas for us all to practice in our workshops.

Big thanks to Richard for entertaining us for the evening, we are sure to see him again as this was an excellent demo.

Thanks Zak for another great write up and please have a look in the Gallery HERE for the collection of screenshots taken during the demo.

This Saturday, 26 Nov 22, from 10am to midday, we will be opening up the Club Shop whilst we are running the Training Day in the main hall.  We have a great selection of timbers and other woodturning tools, finishing products, project kits and pens kits and much more to keep you busy.  So please pop in it will be great to see you.

What’s up next?

6 Dec 2022 – Committee Meeting from 7pm on Zoom.

13 Dec 2022 – Last Hands on Night in the Hall and last Club Shop opening before Christmas.

20 Dec 2022 – To give our Turners a break from their workshops, we will have an online Social Evening instead.  Bring some Christmas cheer, snacks and a drink.  We will have a chat and do the Show and Tell so send in your photos and any videos you may have made of your Woodturning exploits.

Then that’s it until the New Year.