Posted on by Alec Mutch

Report on our meeting 26-05-2022, managed by Alan Geddes.

Our meeting on Thursday 26th May was about making wooden boxes, this meeting was organised by Alan Geddes. Alan had all 5 lathes in operation with a turner on each, the turners whilst all making boxes were all working in their own way and producing a variety of wooden boxes.

I took a few pictures of the turners as they were working on their boxes, some of which I have put on show here, along with a little bit of information on each turner.

On Lathe 1, we have Nick Simpson, Nick started by using a piece of Laburnum that turned out to be a little to moist for him to continue with it, picture 2 he can be seen working on his 2nd option, and in picture 3 an almost complete bee hive turned box.
On Lathe 2, we have Julian Cox working on a piece of Laburnum, picture 4 shows him sanding the inside of the lid of his box. in picture 5 we can see Julian working on hollowing out the inside of his box. This was Julian’s first time as a demonstrator at our club, he is also a very recent member of our club having joined just a few months ago.
On Lathe 3, we have Dave Line, picture 6 shows Dave making his first cuts on his box, 7, here Dave is working on an extended finial as part of the lid, 8, shows Dave working on the final finish, 9, Dave holding his finished box, Dave embellished his box with a few friction burnt lines.
On Lathe 4, we have Alan Geddes, Alan organised this meeting. Alan was also working on a piece of Laburnum. 10, shows him working on the inside of the lid. 11, working the outside of the body of his box. 12, shows Alan cutting the spigot on the base of his box to match the recess in the lid, 13, this was as far as Alan got in the time available he would go on to finish it at home.
On Lathe 5, we have John Ruickbie, 14, shows John working on the inside of his box, 15, here John is applying some finish to the outside of his box, 16, here John is working on the lid, you will be able to see he has inset a piece of Blackwood to the lid. 17, Here John is holding his finished box.

That concludes the report on the actual turners and turning but there was again a fairly good number of items brought in by our members for the show and tell table, picture of which follows.

As you can see there was a wide range of different boxes, also a couple of goblets and 2 bowls. the members are always very curious to see other peoples work and ideas and we would like to see even more of them in the future meetings. A heart felt thank you to all those who did bring in some items to show.

The turnout for this meeting was the highest we have had since the club re-opened in late 2021, we have been running at about 40% turnout, this week we were over 50% for the turnout.

Our next meeting is on the 9th June, that meeting is being managed by Dave Line and Dave’s theme for the meeting is making wooden bowls, he will have all 5 lathes in operation and we are looking to get a good turnout.

Finally our thanks go out to all the turners who man the Lathes.