Utilizing our talents? (another long musing)

Finally, something I would agree on!

(visualize 1 eye closed here, in a winking motion)

While the germ of a great idea is there, the nature of the usenet beast seems to be such that the true gems of teaching come as a tangent or as a fortuitous after-thought. Often, I believe, the authors are blissfully unaware that what they wrote as a simple response is a welcome addition to the understanding of a large group.

It was the tangents that brought proprioception to the fore and explained (and named) what and how we've been doing things all along, tangents brought us a treatise on metalurgy and tool hardness, an odd moment of reflection gave rise to an understanding of the need for balance in design, someone's reminiscence brings back techniques almost lost to modern turners.

Even the genial, and sometimes not so genial, arguments about which tool for which cut, or best wax or non-wax, low price tools, Stubbby vs Nova vs General vs BiggerIronCo lathes, and yes even down to the LDD vs non- LDD holy warts (misspelling intentional)... these bring a different sort of enlightenment, not only about our compatriots and the zeal they have for the "cause" but also the thoughtful and insightful answers, even if they are not to our own way of thinking.

It would be wonderful is there was a weekly or monthly "feature" thread. A definitive discourse on a single topic, pulling expertise from all arenas. A round-robin discussion amongst the various experts in a field. Unfortunately the usenet beast being what it is, we must rely on those serendipitous moments, and put trust that they will continue with the next generation of turners learning, and the previous generation not leaving for more placid locales.

Well. It's either that or I just need to get out more often.

-- Vic with apologies for misspellings and grammatical gaffes.

Thanks for a thinking man's response, Vic. RCW is truly healthy. Arch

Fortiter,

Arch, the web-based woodturning forums that have sprung up in the last couple years provide the organized, moderated communication that you yearn for. There's the AAW forum;

; ; and WoW to name the ones I'm aware of and visit regularly, and know you do too.

RCW is the last bastion of unmoderated interchange, more conversational, and more like the real world where you take the bad with the good. I just hope that the talented and knowledgable people stick around--I sense that the web-based forums threaten RCW's existance!

Ken Grunke SW Wisconsin

Coulee Region Woodturners AAW chapter

They're no threat. You'll notice there are no popup ads here, no scrolling ads, no garish colors, no 20 second wait for banners to load, etc. Just nice fast small text messages. Clean and to the point. I never participate in web based forums for sport. I will utilize them for tech support but only so long as I need something resolved. I'm sure many others are like me.

Not slamming those that have a nice fast broadband connection and don't mind all the foofoo that comes w/web based discussion boards, but us "old school" guys aren't going anywhere any time soon...

...Kevin

My thanks to all of you for your reasoned as well as your courteous responses. I re-read my post and compared my musing with each of yours. We really are all on the same page. Rcw's warts seem to be best left alone. ************************* Now for conformity, here's some important Q's & A's: 1. How do you cut off & finish wooden dowels at the bottom of a stopper cork?

1. How do you clean stained or dirty bottle stopper corks?
2. What is the best method to put a company, club or personal logo on a bottle stopper that doesn't make the stoppers too costly for the average market?
3. BTW, you can drill a hole in a file with a center drill at slow speed, heavy pressure and no lubricant. Takes time and destroys the center drill, but does work. I have done it. One hole for one center drill? Cost effective?
4. Sharp ebony scraps will often burn dark grooves in wood better than wire will, but don't put wax or oil on first.
5. Will boiling vinegar, concentrate or boil-off the acetic acid? 6a. Will heating an iron vinegar mix hasten or deepen its ebonizing properties? 6b. Will adding strong tea to the iron-vinegar mix instead of the wood improve or ruin its ebonizing properties?
6. How is lacquer made to be gloss or semi-gloss?. 7a. Re finishes and finishing; when does flat or low gloss become semi-gloss and this become gloss then high gloss? Analog vs digital ?
7. How are toothpicks that bulge in the middle made?
8. Do factory workmen use sharpening jigs on turning tools? How about disc or wheel grinders and/or belt sanders? If they do, which ones? If not, why not?
9. Where is it written that you must be a widely known turner/artist or something of a local expert before your sloppy tooling and ratty finishing is considered to be contemporary quality instead amateurish?

Finally an elementary quiz: Is arithmetic and time keeping different for woodturners? If a turner makes 48 bowls every 24 hours and turns 2 bowls per hour for a year, what does he do in his spare time? Ans. He posts to RCW. Arch

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I spent a few years as a paint store owner, so I will attempt to answer question 7. Any liquid finish may contain some amount of solids. As the finish dries, the liquid shrinks and becomes solid. If the amount of solids in the film is small, the smooth liquid layer becomes a smooth solid layer, and you end up with gloss. If the particles of solid filler protrude slightly through the dry lquid layer, the smooth reflection is disrupted, and you get a semigloss. And, further, if the liquid shrinks well below the solid filler, the surface is rough (on a microscopic scale,) so reflected light is more or less completely diffused, and the surface is "flat"--not shiny at all.

If you paint a piece of bare lumber with a gloss enamel, the penetration is greatest in that part of the grain which is softest, so the liquid is absorbed by the wood, and the paint dries flat. On the harder parts of the grain, where penetration is a minimum, there will likely be a fair amount of gloss. This is because the absorption by the wood affects mainly the liquid part of the paint. The solids are generally too large to travel through the pores of the wood, so they stay on the surface.

Not particularly cost effective, however I found that using an inexpensive carbide drill bit, moderate pressure, slow speed, and a cutting oil dam gave me a 1/4" hole in a reasonable time (about 45 mins IIRC). For what it's worth- file was clamped to a block of wood and the drill table, a dam of plumber's putty held the cutting oil, and a stretched-out ancient bungee cord provided pressure on the drill head.

I tried using a bamboo pot scraper instead of wire last week. It handled much like a parting tool and gave a clean sharp line. Holding it at varied angles will thicken or thin the line, as will sharpening the edge. Since I do all the cooking, SWMBO will never notice the thing's missing from the kitchen.

/vic

Or, the embedded additives are of sufficient size or refractive difference to scatter the light a bit even with a buffed surface. Surface will glare, but finish still lacks clarity.

Cheese cutters, the ones with the wire a tthe end of the metal handle, work well as burn tools. Most Salvation Army and other thrift stores have them for 10 cents.

I turned the blade backwards in my old coping saw, it worked well to burn in a little line.

-Dan V.

"Dan Valleskey" wrote: I turned the blade backwards in my old coping saw, it worked well to burn in a little line. ^^^^^^^^^^^ That's a neat idea, Dan. Thanks. I'll bet Fred Holder would publish that in his Tips column if you sent it in.

Would make a narrow burn alright. I think there may be a suitable substitute. I use regular annealed steel picture hanging wire, which, at two bucks for 50 feet doesn't cause me much concern about getting pieces long enough to protect my fingers.

Supposing that other non-galvanized wire might be annealed and used as well. I've used old (electric) fence wire without softening.

It's always nice to see good responses to Q's, A's & comments. You know that you aren't plonked 100%, and preaching to the void, plus you learn. Thanks for your answers to some of my 10, and TIA for your answers to the others? I add #11. Is there a url containing a wiring diagram for the new Jet mini speed control? Arch

Fortiter,

Okay, I've read the whole thread, and here's one that nobody mentioned. PUBLICIZE IT. Tell people about it. An astounding number of people don't even know of the existence of newsgroups. 95%+ of the people I have told about rec.crafts.woodturning also needed instructions on how to find it, and even then some of them never succeeded. We seriously need to get the word out big time. This forum should be THE place to go for woodturning discussion, but it ain't gonna happen unless we talk it up A LOT. Give a presentation at your club. Write up something for your club newsletter. Devote a couple minutes to it EVERY time you demonstrate. Somebody with more free time than me needs to write articles advertising our existence for all the woodworking magazines, and with good instructions on how to access newsgroups in general because they are a total mystery to most internet users. Kevin Miller listed some good reasons people should be coming here that makes us not just another place for woodturning discussion. Mention those things when you talk it up. I'll add my favorite: free speech. This is the best reason for the existence of newsgroups at all. We are not moderated, nobody owns this group, nobody has editorial control over what shows up here, everybody can speak his mind and be heard. I use newsgroups in preference to www based forums as much as possible for anything I want to research, not just woodturning.

best wishes to all,

-mike paulson, fort collins, co

Thanks, Leo. That was the best explanation of that I have ever read.

-mike paulson, fort collins, co

I agree, I wouldn't want that. But Arch's idea was for just once in a while, not all the time, and I do like that. I think I'd like to see a topic of the week/month/whatever. It would have to be unmoderated and rely on the honor system to stick to the topic and lay off the chatter, and especially seek knowledgeable input from those with skill and experience for the purpose of enhancing the already extensive archive. Arch, I think you should go ahead and start it and see if it flies. You pick the topic, begin the thread with some goals for that thread only, and let's see if it's successful.

best wishes,

-mike paulson, fort collins, co

And newsgroups are archived. Ours is already a formidable resource.

-mike paulson, fort collins, co

****************************************************

Arch, I don't know if there's a specific diagram for the Jet. However, since it runs on a 115VAC, single phase line, I would guess it works the same as router speed controls. Sort of a SCR type light dimmer switch on steoids, or a Variable Speed drill. There should be numerous schematics on some of the usenet electronics sites. Just my opinion, FWIW, not necessarily the facts. {:-))

Ken Moon Webberville, TX