Learning to Turn

Although I did have a place at Exeter University to read maths I decided not to go and instead started teaching myself how to turn. I had never really thought about woodturning before and just assumed that woodturners only made items such as bowls, clocks, mushrooms, light pulls and other craft show items. After all these were the only items I had ever seen turners produce when I had gone round craft shows.

I had sort of mastered the bowl already, although I would need a little practice to achieve the quality finish I was aiming for, and so I began trying to turn the other items people generally associate with woodturning. Even at that stage I was already trying to add my own style to the simple craft pieces and so began turning various series of beads and grooves on the rims of the bowls and platters.

I couldn’t afford much at the time but a small investment in a couple of videos that were going really cheap made a big difference. For the first time I found out about two main types of turning, spindle turning or faceplate turning and what’s more that you used particular chisels for particular jobs. The general rule was that spindle gouges were used for spindle turning and bowl gouges for faceplate turning.

With the aid of the video’s I tried to master all the techniques shown, at the same time as expanding the range of craft work I was producing. It was hard at first but I gradually found that, with perseverance, as my skills at turning increased I was getting a better finish with the chisels, which meant less sanding was required to get a good overall finish.

Now all I had to do was to find a way to sell the work I had made.