Duncan Hoyle

See attached file

The Teknatool Nova DVR 3000 lathe had no facility for a remote control box and I think this is a serious oversight as turning large items, especially from the tailstock end, can make it difficult to reach the existing controls. I found the wiring diagram on the old MSN Nova group and produced my own.

The attached pdf document is my 2nd version and includes some images and a wiring diagram.

Although it's possible to get the wiring wrong apparently it isn't critical as the circuit is low voltage. When making my first version I got a couple of wires crossed and, whilst it didn't work, the lathe didn't blow up!

If you follow this guide and your lathe is damaged I take no responsibility.

In summer 2011 Teknatool announced the production of their own remote, which is wireless.

OK, so the plan of a turning every 2 weeks didn't work at all for various reasons.

This year I'll try for one a month and count anything more than that a bonus.

To start things off here are a couple of mirrors which I made as presents at the end of last year

I was away for 2 weeks and it's taken a while to get things in order in the shed, so I don't have anything finished (or anything new even started). I have produced something though and it's something I've needed for a while now - a sturdy extension for my sawtooth bits.

It's 16cm long x 2cm diameter and made from part of a length of steel which I was using as a hollowing tool. I already have others so I figured I'd sacrifice a bit of length for the drill extension. It was all turned on the wood lathe by hand and is reasonably accurate, or at least as accurate as I need it to be.

As I'll soon be heading to Scotland (but unfortunately missing the World Porridge Championships) I thought I'd try making a spurtle. Never having used or even seen one before I basically just made a spindle with a handle at one end and not much decoration at the other (to avoid stuck food).
Total length is 23cm. Wood is Hawthorn and finish is home-made bees/carnauba wax mix.

So here it is then, my first post of completed work. 2 boxes made over the last 3 days, although the sycamore one is perhaps pushing the definition of box a bit too far.

Both are about 10cm tall and are finished with Chestnut Microcrystalline Wax, which I was using for the first time. Appears to work well and buffs up to a glossy finish.

Here's another action shot. I was attempting to capture the length of shavings that you can get when wet wood is cutting well and the tool is freshly sharpened. Well over 2m is possible.

And yes, this project is also still on the bench waiting to be finished

Wet wood can be translucent when turned thin enough, and this property can be used to your advantage to help achieve a uniform wall thickness.

As wood drys it's cells shrink at different rates depending on their type orientation. If the walls of a turning are uniform it allows for uniform cell shrinkage throughout and enables the walls to move as they shrink. If the walls are too think or are of uneven thickness then the stresses in them when they attempt to shrink due to drying can cause them to split.

When using the property to your advantage you can put a light inside the turning and continue removing wood until you have a uniform glow. As you can see from the slightly darker section at the base I didn't do a perfect job with this one. Luckily, when the wood dries it looses this translucency (unless the wood is really thin) so no-one will know.

The piece is still, of course, sat in the shed waiting to be finished...

This was a month or so before my decision to start a blog but I thought it would be interesting to give an idea of the business end of the shed and show my fashionable spring turning attire! Note the fetching headgear combo of air filter mask and upside down ear defenders (with wires leading to noise deadening headphones and mp3 player).

The tool is a home-made job combining a 3/4" square steel bar and a Woodchuck carbide insert

Back in April (I think) I was getting fed up of the mess in my shed/workshop and figured that one way to solve it, or at least help, was to start up a blog with the aim of finishing an item within a given time and then posting it. As well as helping clear the shed it would hopefully spur me on to create more and start some sort of progression in my work, both in terms of technique and style.

So far it's not gone well, but hopefully from here on in I'll be sticking to posting at least one item every two weeks