Woodturning with Martin Adomat

I had the opportunity of doing a woodturning course with Martin Adomat in Bethlehem which is a suburb of a town called Lengenwang in southern Germany. The theme of the course was 'Design and structuring'. The turning was done with wet oak as it has a lot of acid in the wood which reacts nicely with the later treatment. For the surface decoration I did the grooves with a sharp parting tools and then brushing it with a bronze brush attached to a hand drill. Finally it was then 'smoked' overnight with ammoniac which gave a dark finish with lots of variation and character.

The next photo is a close up of the surface effect after the 'smoking'

After drying, the wood moved quite a bit to give an oval form

I like the effect that can be achieved and still want to experiment a bit more with some variation, also to see which other south african woods has enough acid to give similar effects.
Photographs again are not very proffesional as they were taken in my small flat in Ulm with my cellphone.

Another turn

The large bowl in my previous blog has now dried completely, it came off the lathe at allmost 5 kg and has now stabilised at 2,8 kg. It dried very nicely without any cracking and is now ready for finishing. This I hope to do in the next few weeks so will keep you up to date with the progress. I have again done a lot of travelling in the past month but managed to be at home this weekend. I am not only a woodturner but really like machinery as well and I have been looking for a metal lathe now for some time. I managed to find a second hand lathe/ mill combination which is still in a very good condition. I visited the owner yesterday and am now the proud owner of an Emco V10p lathe/mill combination. I still need to get it to my place so will have to arrange transport and some hands to help me carry. Will post some pictures when it arrives in my workshop. I also did some turning yesterday afternoon and used a piece of Wild Syringa which I got in the morning from At Smit. It was still wet on the inside but dry on the outside with the marks which worms, ants and insetcs have left. I have tried to retain this and give the turning some character. See the attached photograph, it still needs final sanding and finishing. The quality of the photo is not great as it was done quickly with my cellphone.

First turning for 2012

Had a good rest during December in Jongensfontein but shortly after my return I was back in Germany again. Returned yesterday and on my arrival I found a large piece of  Cape Ash in my garage which my fellow woodturner At Smit had left in my workshop. It had been cut during the week and I could not resist the temptation to put it on my lathe. The piece was about 30kg and I started on a large bowl.

After a while the workshop was filled with shavings which will take some time to clean. The wall thickness is about 15mm which will take some time to dry without cracking. My recipe is to cover it with the shavings and newspapers and then seal it in a plastic bag. The newspaper is replaced every day untill the weight stays constant. So lets hold breath and see what the result will be in a few weeks.