One of the last things I did in 2008 was to get my lathe running.
This wasn't just a matter of getting all the pieces to gether and making them fit — it involved cleaning about half the shed just so I would have a place to use the thing. I collected almost a decade's worth of wood scraps and gave them away to a family with a fireplace (I love Freecycle) and vacuumed up sawdust by the gallon. Ten years worth of junk wasn't pretty.
The lathe itself, despite the cobbled-together nature, came together very nicely.
Allan helped me a bit — electricity and I haven't always gotten along well.
You know how much stuff I had to clean to be able to get this in here?
Putting chisel to wood for the first time. What am I making? I... don't know, actually. But it was fun to do, very smooth, and nice to hold!
Now that I've got it running, I do realize one egregious oversight: I don't have any woodturning chisels! I got some practice in with a framing chisel, but there were many things about it that were less than ideal — like making a nice gentle curve with something that is inherently square. So now I need to sit down with the catalogs and find myself a good set of tools to use with my newest toy...
2 comments:
I love how when you aquire something for "free" it requires you to purchase other things so you can use the amazing 'free' thing now have in your possession...
Oh, I had no doubt I'd need more tools for this (there's a tool for every job, so for every job, I get a tool...) but what surprised me was that I hadn't planned ahead and had the new tools on hand for the occasion.
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