Ten ways to leave your local mentor, musing about taking courses(long)

Arch,

I have had the benefit of having the San Diego Woodturning Centre in my own back yard. It has enabled me to take a number of classes from many "world renowned" turners without paying the travel costs.

One of the pitfalls of taking classes with the luminaries of the field is that it is easy for a novice to be overwhelmed by their tutor. At the risk of name dropping, when I took my first class (John Jordan), I turned like him, finished like him and sharpened like him. Then I took a Raffan class and I was a Raffan affecionado. I went through a Stuart Batty phase, a Jimmy Clewes phase, a Christian Burchard phase, etc. - you get the idea.

At some point, you need to take the new tools and concepts you have learned and make them your own. Instead of looking at the masters and trying to deviate from them, you need to arrive at "what turns you on", THEN apply the tools, tricks and tips. I've been turning now for about seven years and consider myself very competent, but I still struggle with finding "me" in the turning. You can't get that in a class nearly as easily as a new grind on a bowl gouge.

Joe Fleming - San Diego

Although I am not a master turner (when I can turn a bowl that doesn't need sanding, and I don't have to use calipers, maybe) or a master teacher, or master demonstrater, I just love to do it. A standard disclaimer I use is something like......... What I am showing you are the skills that I have picked up over the years. I have learned a lot by experimenting (I think that is called trial and error), and have been influenced by a lot of other turners. I don't do anything to the extent that I do it the same way every time. I reserve the right to change my mind on how I do things at any time. What I do may or may not work for you, but hopefully it will give you some ideas of things that you may want to try, as well as different ways of doing things. All of God's children are different, and some of us are more different than others. robo hippy

I started college at 30 and was paying my own way with some help from the GI Bill. A couple of times I had a wee chat with a professor re their marital problems, car problems, child problems, etc. might be interesting over a beer, but it was Not why I was paying for the class. In those days I was much more polite than I might be now - time's winged chariot is also a factor now.

How true is that. We have had more than few grace our halls (OK, warehouse space) and the difference in turning styles of the membership changed rapidly after the visit. And if some of the guys took the one

- two day course that is usually offered with a visit from one of the nationally known guys, it is hilarious. We get comments like "when I was having lunch with George Hatfield", or "Stuart Batty and I were talking about that very thing a few weeks ago and I showed him how I liked to do that".

Some of them are so talented and make it look so easy to do whatever aspect they are known for, we in the audience think - by gawd - that's the way I wanna do it. When Brennon came here and showed how he hollows, you have never seen so many people (me included) in amazement at how fast he starts that process. He uses a 3/8 bowl gouge with a long edge on each side of more than an inch, sharpened/shaped by hand to more than 60 degrees up the side. The nose was almost a point.

He looked like a board planer with his showers of chips and curls, and we were thinking THAT was the way to get it done. At the next meeting we had ALL chickened out in grinding our gouges that way, and while we modified our grinds, none of us went as far as he did (1 1/4" long grind down the side by my actual measure). One of our members did manage to bend his bowl gouge though, and the catch was so dramatic it broke the ferrule. OK... alright....it was me. Hey... I had to try it.

But the lesson learned for me was to be about 1/2 as agressive with the grind angle and it works well. This means that I am half again as agressive as I was before.

I am fortunate that I can learn many things from reading, and that includes things that have been posted here. I have learned a ton by practice, practice, practice, but the old addage does apply, "imperfect practice makes imperfect results". I have found the best source of hands on business is when our club takes a Saturday and we have open house. Only the dedicated or secure show up with the tools that they need help with, and with out group it turns out to be a well balanced affair.

Some have new tools, some have better sharpening advice, some are better at recognizinig what to do with a piece of wood, some guys finish better, and on and on. While we all get some neat inspiration from the pros, we also have a lot of hands on stuff passed back and forth on these days that are set to address one particular problem or area of concern. This is absolutely invaluable.

Last open house I got an hour's worth of instruction on how to easily cut beads and coves with the skew (our skew expert uses one hand on 2" square poplar to make a point about proper presentation), and then drank a Coke. I spent an hour and half regrinding a guy's bowl gouges for him, and then I ate some hot dogs.

After break, I spent some time holding a guy's elbow and hand to show him the arm movement and poistion needed to make an Ellsworth grind without a jig. Then I did a demo on using the parting tool to part, plane, and to use it as a detail gouge. Then more hot dogs for lunch.

While the pros are great for inspiration, and are certainly wonderful to teach the one or two things they are really known for, I would rather learn in a more relaxed environment from our club guys. We are lucky as some are quite good and not the least bit hesitant about sharing their techniques. We take it all seriously, and when we are in the teaching/learning area it is all very serious and you would think it was an organized class of one on one turners. However, around the grill it is different as it is a wonderful time to compare notes on turning, discuss ideas, and catch up on who has wood to trade.

I have never taken a class on woodturning, either. They are always held during the week, and I am uncomfortable being away from my biz all day long with the cell phone off. But I think the most important items highlighted by Arch in his post above would have to be to me #6 and #10.

Robert

Thanks Joe, I think you have reached the stature that when I mention you are an internet friend, I'm "name dropping".

Thanks robo, Disclaim all you want, but we could all learn a lot from your demo, just as we have from your posts here.

Thanks for #11 Lobby, After WW2, FSCW (women) became FSU (co-ed). Those "mature GIs" really shook up the existing faculty...the girls were very happy. :)

Thanks Robert, Maybe you could make it look easy too...if you were provided with selected wood blanks and the best of equipment to demo a piece that you had turned hundreds of times before. Once I suggested that our club host a willing expert with a sense of humor and have him/her demo as in some of the member's real world...ie. in a phone booth, turning a unrehearsed form from punky wood on a AMT lathe using HF's bottom line tools. I was shouted down and not for the first time either. :)

Turn to Safety, Arch Fortiter

I operate on the theory that I am as smart as the next guy. My fear is that if I drop my methods, and adopt a spectacularly successful technique I have just seen, I will be diverted from a breakthrough of my own. I wouldn't want to deny my fellow woodturners the benefit I am about to discover. Yeah, right! ;-)

Man that would separate the turners from the demo masters, wouldn't it? We had a turner here that had his tools sent to another place courtesy of the airlines. He didn't have his tools, his jigs, his wood, and in general his "stuff" when he demoed. He was supplied with Sorby and Crown tools, and told to PLEASE grind them anyway he wanted with the underlying motive being that someone would have a tool ground by a master to take home and study.

He had a terrible time, and he was so out of sorts after the first 30 minutes or so it was actually embarassing. We heard every excuse in the book. The flip side was when Stuart Batty came, and I swear that guy could turn a Tiffany lampshade with a scredriver.

I think your request holds water, Arch. I am reminded of a woodworking show I went to a few years ago and they were demoing some new sawblade. It was laser cut and computer balanced. It was so well ligned, sharpened and designed that (like a Forest) it didn't leave any saw marks. This guy cross cut, ripped, and angle cut with a miter gauge on a delta table saw that had the wings taken off. He put a pieced 4/4 of cherry in the saw, ripped it about 12 inches and left it there; after a couple of minutes, he took it out and there was nary a sign of burning or teeth.

Here's the parallel (for those with turning idols, this doesn't apply to anyone you know or have heard of!). I stuck around after the 20 minute demo and asked him some more questions about the blade. Then I asked him how long he had been a woodworker. Well, he replied, never. He had goofed around some with his Dad as a kid, but was looking for a job when this came up. They trained him to do the demos, and that was it. He was paid a commision for every blade sold at the show and a smaller one for everyone that called the office and gave them the local trade show number when ordering.

All he could do was rip, crosscut and angle cut boards. Never built a project in his life. But he did have lots of kinds of wood to demo the blade on if you had a question, and everyone kinda took the flannel shirt, hiking boots and worn ball cap as the uniform of a woodworker.

Too funny.

Robert

I am right there with you. Once I perfect getting beat to death small bowl gouge with a super agressive grind, I intend to go on the road.

It will look like the three stooges with one missing. I am imagining the gouge whacking me all over held by an invisible hand. Don't know how much valuable knowledge would be imparted, but the sound of that catch is still ringing in my ears. THAT has to be worth something to see someone do that!

Robert

I'd pay to see it! :o)

the gouge whacking me all over held by an invisible hand. Don't know how much valuable knowledge would be imparted, but the sound of that catch is still ringing in my ears. THAT has to be worth something to see someone do that!

A while back I was at a turning demo put on by a world famous turner who shall remain nameless. He was making some great cuts in a piece of green, sound, clear black cherry and the shavings were flying. So were the sales pitches for his name sake, specially ground and formed gouges. One of the fellows looked at Maurice Gamblin, an excellent turner, and said, "Maurice, is there even one of those cuts you can not make with a standard 1/4" gouge?" Maurice replied that for a couple he would want a parting tool and mabe a 3/8" for one or two. On the other hand Maurice has no tools named after him. Sometimes the price of fame is $69.95 for a fancy gouge :-)

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Seems like I could make a living on the road demoing as a bad example!!

Ken Moon Webberville, TX.

"Ken Moon" wrote: Seems like I could make a living on the road demoing as a bad example!! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ What a great idea. It seems like, after a while, everything that can be demoed (is that a word?) has been done to death. Ken, if you ever do this, please put me on your list for a video (at a reasonable price, of course.)

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Since this group has probably experienced just about everything that shouldn't be done on a lathe, they'd make a great advisory group.:-)

Ken