Wood turning projects approach the central theme of many wood turning activities, the learning and development of new skills. Like many if not all of the arts and crafts of the world, wood turning is an activity that knows of no bounds to learning. There are always new things to master.

In order to appropriate a particular set of cutting modes and turning stances it is necessary to repeat the same cuts and motions many times. Here is the place where wood turning projects shine. Rather than a set of exercises performed over and over with nothing to show for results except shavings, you can finish with an assortment of gifts or small articles for sale.

Keeping the wood turning projects small in size accomplishes a few things for us:

• cost is kept to a minimum. While some of the projects should be turned in inexpensive local woods, if the final piece is to be made in an exotic and expensive wood, at least one of the practice pieces should be as well.
• repetition is encouraged as each project pieces is brought to a finish
• it is easy to see where improvement is called for on the next turning and it is quick to get to it
• mistakes are easy to see and learn from. If the practice project is deemed not fit for repair cuts there is little waste, little expense, and an easy opportunity for repetition with better success.
• the needed cuts may be practiced without a lot of distraction. It is likely that many of the project cuts are not those needed to be practiced but the size of the piece allows them to be quickly accomplished and the new cuts attended to. Of course it should be noted at the same time that all cuts are good practice and every one can be improved upon.

Wood turning is a collection of skills that need to be mastered so as to free the creative impulses to design on the fly. In a sense the wood lathe is the potter’s wheel turned 90°. All the forms of the turning potter are available to us but like the potter, they can only be accomplished if they are learned well. This is a learning not only of the mind but also the body and unlike the potter, it is far more difficult to return lost wood whereas clay may be remoulded many times. The wood turning project allows the wood turner to practice the techniques that need to be second nature when creating the final product.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

There are several wood turning projects fully explained on the web site. In particular, a selection of beginner’s projects may be found on the Beginner’s Projects page complete with explanation and step by step photos.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Wood turning projects are a great way to learn new skills and to refresh old ones. They generally come with instructions from start to finish and hopefully with lots of pictures to give further guidance. However, the very nature of wanting to learn a new skill determines that the project needs to be repeated several times until the skills are developed. Often it is the case where the first is fascinating, the next couple are fun, and fourth is a challenge and rest are boredom but should be done. Since most of us who turn are hobbyists, boredom can be a killer to the craft. Thankfully, there are three simple ways to dress up a project, each or which may add its own challenges and interests.

First there is the obvious method of adding beads and coves. While it may seem like a simple solution to boredom one needs to ask where each bead or cove goes and whether it “works” with other beads, coves, straights and curves. If it goes on a handle does it make the handle more or less comfortable to use? Are there artistic reasons for placement or utilitarian ones such as distinguishing one tool from another while it is on the bench amidst the shavings? Adding beads and coves to spindle woke is so common that it is good practice for all spindle turning but face plate projects should not be neglected either. One bead at the rim of a bowl may give it an elegant look while a fully beaded surface will change the grain appearance strikingly, particularly in a broad grained wood like oak or ash.

Second one might add a line of color with burning or wood displacement. To burn a line on a rotating piece of wood one first suspends a thin wire between two wooden handles. Holding the wire without handles is asking for burned, cut or removed fingers while using the handles renders the activity safe. As the wood rotates at good speed it is first grooved slightly to prevent the wire from slipping as it is held in the groove. Pressure is applied by pulling the wire taut between the handles and friction causes a burn line to form. The depth of color can be controlled with additional pressure or the duration of the burn.

Wood displacement adds a line of color by actually transferring a bit of wood from one piece to the next and tends to work best on faceplate work although it can be used on spindles. It also works better with dark woods being used to color light ones. For instance if a bowl of maple is turning on the lathe, a thin piece of rosewood about 6 inches long and 1 inch wide but only 1/16″ thick may have its edge brought to the spinning wood. Under a bit of pressure a bit of the rosewood will actually be transferred to the spinning maple. The band may be darkened by holding the rosewood in place a bit longer and broadened simply by moving it left and right.

Third is adding color to the wood. For some this is a shock under the belief that wood turnings should always be left natural, but people have been coloring them since turning started. Color may be added easily with felt markers while the wood turns or is stationary. The varieties of paints and stains available are amazing indeed. Leather dyes should not be overlooked. They use an alcohol solvent that will not raise the grain the wood, apply and dry quickly, and allow the grain of the wood to show through. Again there is a wide variety of colors available and they all mix well to give infinite choice.

Each of these methods and many others allow for adaption of wood turning projects to make them into signature pieces for a turner while learning a variety of techniques and style without the boredom of undue repetition.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

There are several wood turning projects fully explained on the web site. In particular, a selection of beginner’s projects may be found on the Beginner’s Projects page complete with explanation and step by step photos.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Wood turning has swept the wood working world as the fastest growing part of its methods. This of course has meant the growth of the wood lathe manufacturing industry as more and greater styles of lathe are being made. While this has meant a great deal of choice for the advanced turner with some idea of what he or she may desire in a machine, the buyer of one’s first wood turning lathe may be in for a shock and a quandary over what lathe to buy.

The wood turning web sites do not in general come as any great help. While there are lots of places to learn to turn, most wood turners are self taught and are experienced in using only one lathe, perhaps two if they have upgraded along the way. Also there may be a lot of opinions given from people who have only one turning interest in life. The turner of large bowls who can not imagine that any one would like to turn anything else has a hard time recommending a lathe to someone who wishes to make intricate lace bobbins weighing less than an ounce.

Of course the other side of the picture is the web sites give a glimpse into the world of many kinds of wood turners using many wood turning lathes and making a wide range of round objects. Many of them have at least a picture of their lathes and some have personal reviews of their machines and tooling. It is a good idea for the beginner to get an idea of what is available.

Even better is the local wood turning club. Examine your local paper or bulletin board or contact the American Association of Woodturners which has branches in many countries. Wood turning clubs tend to be some of the friendliest places on earth with a great deal of information mixed with camaraderie. A typical meeting will deal with minimal business, a demonstration of wood turning and a members show and tell. Most clubs have a lathe that can be seen and some have one or more to lend.

Then there are the club members. Most clubs will have people who have turned for years and may be professional as well as intermediate and beginning hobbyists. It is normal for people of all levels to exchange opinions and ideas without prejudice for age or experience. What is more useful still for our discussion is most turners would welcome a newcomer into their midst to come and try their lathe. This is a great way to see what a lathe can do under some experienced instruction. Looking at a series of lathes should give an idea of what you would like to turn and what sort of wood turning lathe you would like to have.

While you are with the other turners do not neglect to get a lesson or two and perhaps a piece of wood. Turners as a group love to teach and each one has something unique to give. As a group they tend to be self taught for the most part, thus opinionated and stubborn over those opinions but great to one another and to anyone who wants to share the addiction. Wood turners and wood turning lathes, in their own way each is the heart of the hobby.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

You can easily ask your questions about wood turning at his blog at Round Opinions as well as comment on any thing related to the web site, this article or other aspects of wood turning, art and craft.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Wood turning bowls seem to be a simple thing, After all, people have done it since the beginning of time. The first lathes appear to have been someone sticking a log between two points of wood or rack, wrapping a rope around the log and pulling it back and forth while someone else cut the inside and out with a sharp rock. In fact the same technique has been observed in India and certain primitive areas although most use tools made of scavenged steel now. While our tools are somewhat more sophisticated now we still turn a bowl that needs to hold water or salad or what have you. Some things do not change.

Many people are drawn to wood turning through the idea of making a bowl. Some of us start new turners on bowl turning instead of spindles. Peter Childs, a famous English wood turner, considered the bowl to be the perfect learning tool for a wood turner. It taught the proper way to hold a tool, to hold one’s body, and to approach and cut the wood. It still does.

Even for people who start turning by making spindles and doing lots of exercises by cutting beads and coves in scrap wood, a bowl is often the first thing they finish that is a practical turning and one to show others. Little do they know that the journey is just beginning.

Turning wood bowls is the sort of thing that beginners do easily and advanced turners have difficulty completing. There are simply too many design choices. At first it is simply a matter of putting a block of wood on the lathe and getting a bowl at the end. All the concentration goes into cutting form and seeing the shavings fly. There is a mystery with the wood itself that must be handled.

In order to turn a bowl you need a big enough piece of wood. Unfortunately, wood this size has usually cracked in the drying so a turner needs to start with wet or “green” wood. This wood will warp as it dries so a wood turner quickly learns patience. First the bowl is roughed from green wood and allowed to warp as it dries. Once dried it is remounted on the lathe and finish turned, sanded and a wood finish applied. So our beginner has a lot of very enjoyable learning to do.

Then comes the day that things change. A bowl blank is removed from the drying pile and mounted to the lathe. Fairly quickly it is returned to round and brought to final thickness. The surface is sanded and a finish is applied. It has become a bowl but without all the difficulty of before. Our turner is well along the learning curve.

Now the question becomes not “is it a bowl?” but “is it a good bowl?” That leads to considerations of what makes a good bowl. How thick should the sides be given a certain size and does that change with color and weight of wood? Is the side of a pleasing curve and will it still look pleasing when gazed at from above as well as below?

These and other questions are the kind that will keep the search interesting for the perfect form in an old style vessel. Wood turning bowls can be a lifetime search.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

You can easily ask your questions about wood turning at his blog at Round Opinions as well as comment on any thing related to the web site, this article or other aspects of wood turning, art and craft.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Bowls have been part of the human existence since we began to hold things and want to keep them. Wood turning bowls has been part of life ever since someone realized that a piece of wood could be hollowed to hold water, food or other treasures. Some of the first indications we have of wood turners are pictures of Egyptian turners on the side of pyramids where one turned wood while another made the wood move with a bow. They were making bowls.

Wood turning bowls became a common need in the villages of the world to the point where “Turner” is almost as common a name as “Smith.” The village wood turner would produce a great deal of the needed kitchen supplies known as “treen” and many of these would be bowls.

Bowls are so common that we forget how elegant they can be. To turn a bowl is not a hard thing, to turn an elegant bowl is difficult. It must have the proper ratio of diameter to height but the mathematical formulas that might be thought to help disappear into insignificance. Turned wooden bowls are generally, like most bowls, fairly small as compared to a piece of significant architecture or a statue by Henry Moore. While I have worked on bowls as much as four feet in diameter and have seen larger, the champion size at the time of this writing is about 7 feet. Most so called large bowls will be 14 to 18 inches around and for most families a 10 to 12 inch salad bowl is big enough.

All of this means that bowls are looked at from a lot of different angles. That salad bowl you see as you approach the table changes in perspective when you sit down. The question in design is how to balance everything so that a bowl seen from above is also elegant seen side on and from a vast degree of angles in between. Will it look as good for the six foot two person at the side as it does for the five foot four one at the head of the table?

Wood turning bowls becomes then, a life long search for the “right” bowl. Of course this is true for the potter as well as the turner and for the ceramicist as well. A quick look through the history of pottery reveals the search for shape in our common bowl as an ongoing part of the story of mankind. Wood turners of today are in good company.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

You can easily ask your questions about wood turning at his blog at Round Opinions as well as comment on any thing related to the web site, this article or other aspects of wood turning, art and craft.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Wood turning lathes seem to be machines on steroids some days. They are getting bigger and more massive all the time. This is likely in response to two trends in the wood turning world. First is the response from manufacturers to a tendency among turners to make bigger and bigger pieces. Second is the prevailing idea that bigger is always better in almost every part of life. Sometimes it is just not so.

Ed Moulthrop was likely not the first to turn large pieces but he became famous for them in the twentieth century. His yard would be filled with huge sections of tree trunk more than three feet in diameter, awaiting their turn on his home made lathe. Most of them would be arranged on a slope above the shop to make them easier to manage when trying to get them indoors. He had to use a block and tackle to get them to and on the lathe and the lathe was home made to get something big enough and slow enough to turn them safely.

Here we get an idea of what the turner of large pieces of wood has to contend with each time a piece goes on the lathe. Wood is heavy and the hardwood that most turners work with is heavier still. When you consider that most of us start with green wood, the weight is even greater. How many people will really want to wrestle with a chunk of wood more than 150 pounds in weight each time they wish to turn? That is a section of log big enough to turn a 24 inch bowl. A 24 inch hollow form will easily start at 300 pounds for the blank. Considering that some turners turn upwards of four foot diameter bowls, the weight is considerable. In maple the blank, assuming you could find a tree 4 feet in diameter, would be about 1200 pounds.

For the average turner, if such a person exists, a big bowl tends to be 12 inches in diameter and for the beginner, 10 inches is a good size. It will hold a lot of salad, is large enough to handle, and can appear more intimidating than it needs to be. Many beginner level lathes will handle a 10 to 11 inch bowl and will generally serve for several years to come.

What is important for the beginner is to obtain a lathe. Be sure it is sturdy enough to use with safety and enjoyment. Wood turning is growing quickly and wood turning lathes for beginners are becoming popular with the manufacturers. This is a good time to begin your enjoyment with a wood turning lathe.

Darrell Feltmate is a juried wood turner whose web site, Around the Woods , contains detailed information about wood turning for the novice or experienced turner as well as a collection of turnings for your viewing pleasure. You too can learn to turn wood, here is the place to start. Wondering what it looks like? Follow the page links for a free video.

You can easily ask your questions about wood turning at his blog at Round Opinions as well as comment on any thing related to the web site, this article or other aspects of wood turning, art and craft.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Darrell_Feltmate

Wood turning tends to be a fairly solitary venture taking place in a work shops around the world. There may be a class or two or monthly meetings of the wood turning club, but for most it will be an hour here and there, privately in the garage, basement or wherever the shop may be found. For the beginner the big question seems to be “What do I turn now?” Most seem to spend some time turning square pieces round and then are not sure where to go next. Enter the wood turning project.

Wood turning projects tend to be set up in much the same way regardless of the finished piece. Instruction is given not only as to what wood to use but also the tools needed, any special sharpening techniques required and how to fix the wood to the lathe. There are generally pictures available and the more the better as each new aspect is introduced. This is of course ideal for the beginner.

Four things should be looked for in a beginner’s wood turning project:

1. Ease of turning but yet a challenge. The procedures should be well within the beginner’s grasp but yet enough of them should be new enough to require learning and give a challenge. The trick to learning to turn is practice, practice, practice and this will be boring without a challenge. At the same, a whole lot of new things to get used to can be frustrating and off putting. Take your time.
2. Inexpensive. Some projects need extra parts or call for exotic woods. The best way to learn is to turn the same thing over and over with minor variations for the sake of interest. Those extra parts and exotic woods can add expense fast. Local woods are cheap and still beautiful to use.
3. Green or fresh cut wood projects are easier to turn and cheaper still. In fact, a lot of green wood is free for the taking as the power company clears lines or the neighbors have to take down a shade tree whose roots are destroying the foundation.
4. Popularity. What are you going to do with all those projects, turned one after another? Sooner or later they move you out of the shop, you turn them into kindling, or you give them away. People love wood turnings. Even if you think they are not good enough to sell, people love a gift.

Wood turning projects present opportunity for learning while enjoying a new hobby, entertain low expense, use up wood that might otherwise be landfill and provide presents for friends and family. Turn, turn, turn.