Hello again its October, time to report on our meeting for this month and our demonstrator this time was our secretary Francis Corr. We didn’t get the lathe out this month because Francis decided he was going to show us how to set out and make a Longworth chuck. I have to admit I had never heard of one until I realised it is a homemade version of what I know as a button chuck.
The Longworth is made from plywood and with a few bolts, wingnuts and stops is a very inexpensive way of adding a very useful tool to our armoury. Francis made this one from 12mm ply, starting the setting out emphasizing the need for complete accuracy and using a compass, a dividers and a straight edge. Now Francis gave a very articulate commentary of his setting out as he worked and again I have to admit I could not quite grasp all the details so I’m not going to try and pass on these in case I get it wrong. So if you are keen to make one, do as I did, as soon as I got home I looked it up on my laptop and that cleared up the bits I hadn’t taken in. The other tools you will need for this is a small router, a jigsaw if you don’t have a band saw and a piece of light ply or plastic to make a trammel.
Francis made a very good point on the need for safety equipment, particularly on dust inhalation; he had a state of the art piece of breathing apparatus which I have to say was beyond my budget but any kind of dust mask will give some protection and we should get the best we can afford.
I’m happy to say we had a lot of entries for our monthly competition, the subject being a table lamp. The standard of workmanship was very high giving a headache to the judge who had to decide on a winner and this place went to Cecil Barron, in second place was Simeon Owens , in third place was Jack O’ Rourke. Well done all, let’s see even more entries next month, a pair of candlestick holders, easy-peasy for you guys.
That’s all I have to report for this month, next month is our AGM and I’m sure we will have a good turnout for that. Work safe and I look forward to seeing you all in November.
Pat Gannon.