Serving Southeastern West Virginia

The West Virginia Woodturners Association provides woodturners in southeastern West Virginia and western Virginia with an opportunity to meet other turners, enhance their skills, and share their skills and interests in woodturning. Send an email to info@wvwoodturners.com to request additional information about the club and its activities.

Turning Center at Lee Street Studios

Progress on the Turning Center at Lee Street is progressing rapidly and the public opening will be on Lewisburg's First Friday, April 6.

The Turning Center is ready for the Grand Opening on First Friday, April 6.

The first class the Club will be offering will be "Fundamentals of Woodturning" on Saturday, May 12 from 9:00 AM until noon. Each course will be open to the public and will cost $25 for members and $50 for non-members. Additional courses on spindle and faceplate turning will also be offered, but the schedule has not been finalized yet.

The Turning Center will be open to all members on the first and third Tuesdays of every month from 6:00 until 9:00 PM for Turning and Learning sessions. This will be an opportunity for members to get together, work on individual projects, share ideas, and seek advice from other turners.

All members will be able to work in the Turning Center any time, any day of the week and use any of the Club lathes, tools, or specialized equipment such as the deep hollowing system and the coring system. Members will pay $2.00 per hour to use the Center. They will sign in and sign out, leave the area neat and clean, take their trash and shavings with them, and pay for their time at the next Club meeting.

The Turning Center will be open to the general public on First Fridays and Second Saturdays when the Lee Street Studio complex is open. A small gallery will be set up where Club members will be able to display and sell their turnings with the Club retaining a 10% commission.

Turning and Learning Sessions

The Club will hold Turning and Learning sessions at the Turning Center from 6:00 until 9:00 PM on the first and third Tuesday each month. All members are invited to bring their favorite tools (or use Club tools) and a project to work on, use a Club lathe, and share ideas with other turners.

The back wall facing Lee Street.

Dan Green taught in this room for many years.

It's beginning to look like a turning center!

The walls and ceilings have been painted, epoxy applied to the floor, lights have been installed, and there are plenty of electrical outlets with spare capacity in the sub-panel.

Next Meeting: April 28

The spring Wood and Tool Auction will be held at Montwell Park on Saturday, April 28. If you have excess wood or tools in your shop, donate them to the Club's auction. If you want to add to your collection, bring your checkbook and place a bid. After Show and Tell and drawings for the door prize and raffle, Bill Sproul will review finishing techniques and display examples of the more common finishing products.

March 24 Meeting Highlights

Twenty one members and one guest attended the March meeting and participated in the door prize and raffle drawings. This was a busy month for turning with a number of Show and Tell pieces being displayed and five members submitting candlesticks and table legs for the January spindle turning Club Challenge

Club Challenge Recognition

The candlesticks and small leg turnings for the January spindle turning Club Challenge were judged separately with six turnings selected for recognition.

Members submitted these seven candlesticks for consideration.

(l) 1st Place: Bob Nickell (ctr) 2nd Place: Steve Withrow (r) 3rd Place: Gerald Chandler

Members turned these five miniature table legs using a story stick for layout.

(l) 1st Place: Gerald Chandler (ctr) 2nd Place: Bruce Brenneman (r) 3rd Place: Jerald Carter

Show and Tell

The Show and Tell judges selected three turnings for recognition:.

Charlie Meyers received top recognition for this winged walnut crotch bowl based on the effective use of the wood and excellent turning and finishing craftsmanship.

Cliff Baker received second recognition for this 12" multi-axis vase turned from sassafrass with a walnut base and finished with pure tung oil.

Third Place recognition was also awarded to Ryan Cox for this pair of cherry bowls that emphasize effective design and excellent turning technique.

Additional Show and Tell Entries

Charlie Myers included a very nice rim on this 10" walnut bowl.

Gerald Chandler created this very nice goblet.

Bob Nickell turned this cheese board with legs and carved the serving knife.

Wayne Aliff turned this pair of ash bowls and a candlestick decorated with turned eggs.

Anna Stables turned this elaborate set of pens using a variety of materials for the pen bodies.

Dave Kuhn solved the puzzle of designing and turning a cabriole leg using the off-center turning technique.

Demonstration: Natural Edge Bowl Turning

Cliff Baker showed how he turns a natural edge bowl and explained his method for drying bowls turned form green wood.Club members are challenged to design and turn a natural edge bowl and display it at the May 19 meeting.

Cliff offered a number of tips and suggestions:

Once a blank is selected, alignment is critical to ensure that the long ends are at the same height and the heights of the edges in the center are the same. Otherwise, the bowl will appear to be tilted.
Proper alignment can be achieved by mounting the blank between a two-prong spur drive and a live center. By changing the position of the 2-prong chuck, the blank can be aligned properly. By rotating the 2-prong chuck, it can always make a solid contact with the blank.
Cliff prefers to use a 1 3/8" pin chuck for mounting the blank to the headstock.
The blank is set on the table of a drill press and the ends are shimmed to give the same height to the edge of the bark. The blank is then moved so the forstner bit is ion the center of the blank, both end-to-end and side-to-side.
Once the blank is properly aligned, a 1 3/8" hole is drilled 2" deep.
An alternate to having a pin chuck machined from solid steel, a 1 3/8" tenon can be turned, gripped by a 4-jaw chuck, and inserted in the drilled blank. A pin with a sharpened tip can be inserted in the end of the tenon which will keep the blank form spinning on the tenon.
A faceplate can also be used if a flat spot can be milled in the center of the blank once it is aligned properly.
The tailstock should always be used to provide additional stability, especially when making the first cuts on the blank (it is almost always out of balance).
After the blank is mounted on the lathe, move away from the workpiece and turn the lathe on at the slowest possible speed. Then turn up the speed until the lathe begins to vibrate.
Depending on the size and balance of the blank, initial turning will probably be between 400 and 800 RPM.
Standing out of the "line of fire" is important when the lathe is first turned up to speed. Even if the workpiece is solid and securely mounted, green wood will sling a lot of sap and bark oft4en flies off older pieces of wood.
The bark often remains attached if the wood had been harvested when the sap was down. If it were harvested between early spring and late summer, the bark tends to be quite loose.
Once the outer profile has been turned, turn a small tenon on the base that can be used to mount the bowl on a 4-jaw chuck. Be sure to mark the center of the tenon.
Be sure to keep track of where the ends of the bowl are while you are turning the inside. Otherwise you risk rapping your knuckels.
If the wood is very green, wear gloves and old clothes since a lot of sap will be thrown form the workpiece.
If any cracks appear while you are turning, immediately seal them with thin CA glue. Turn the walls to the final thickness
The entire bowl should be turned at once to minimize checking, especially if the wood is green. If it is necessary to stop for a break, leave the blank on the lathe but pull a plastic bag over it to keep sap from evaporating and creating small cracks.
After the bowl has been turned to the desired profile, remove it from the lathe, mark the weight and date on the bowl, wrap it in newspaper, and put it in a cardboard box to dry. Every few days, unwrap the bowl, let the paper dry for an hour, and record the weight and date. After a week or two when the newspaper doesn't feel damp, leave the bowl unwrapped until the weight stabilizes. If the was slinging sap when first turned, the weight will decrease by around 30% during the drying period.
After the bowl is dry, mount the bowl with the inside against a 4-jaw chuck and the tailstock live center against the center point of the tenon. Sand the outside surface to 320 grit, grip the tenon with the 4-jaw chuck, and sand the inside surface.
Cliff uses a vacuum chuck to finish the base. Keep the tailstock against the tenon and turn away most of the wood. Move the tailstock away take light cuts to remove the remaining wood.
When using a vacuum chuck, never take cuts beyond the diameter of the chuck. Otherwise the force of the tool will pry the bowl away from the chuck and the bowl will fly off.

New Demonstrations Page

The Demonstrations page has been completely redesigned so individual demonstration topics can be easily found in the categories of Tools, Basic Techniques, and Projects.

General Club Information

For further information about any WVWA activity, call Bill Sproul at (304) 497-2319.

Supporting Companies

We would like to thank these companies for the support they have provided to the Club during the past year. Check out their websites when you are ready to purchase products that they stock.

Craft Supplies USA is a one-stop shopping site for everything a wood turner might need or want - lathes, tools, accessories, project supplies, materials, and more.

Woodcraft offers a 10% discount at the Roanoke store to WVWA members when they show a current membership card.

TurnTex supplies acrylic casting resin, solutions for stabilizing and hardening punky and spalted wood, and associated equipment.

by WVWA, a chapter of the American Association of Woodturners