"Bother," muttered Pooh...

[Skew ChiDAMN!!]

Well... I managed to end todays work with a bang.

I started roughing a blank I sourced from DJ, around 16"x7.5" square. I really only needed a 12"x6" blank, but who am I to complain about it being oversized? (Thanks again, DJ!)

It's still fairly green and is bloody heavy, so I was anticipating my poor ol' "finishing" MC-900 (the only lathe I have which didn't already have something else mounted on it ) would have difficulties. I call it my "finishing" lathe 'cos it's not bolted/weighed down in any way; I usually do my roughing/unbalanced work on another beast and xfer over to this one for the final touches.

So, mark the centres, mounted up the blank with some trepidation... and it just cleared the ways! Phew! The banjo wouldn't squeeze under, but there was just room enough between the end of the blank and the tailstock that I could squeeze it in there and use a long rest. I love it when it all comes together. Started the lathe up at min RPM and... well I'll be! A minor vibration, but nowhere near as bad as I was dreading. Woohoo! Out with the roughing gouge and full steam ahead! So, I knocked it down to exactly 6" diameter, then used my 1" skew and a parting tool to square the ends, also making 40x45mm tenons for mounting in the chuck.

Stopped the lathe and... Oh, Bugger! Grub holes here, there and everywhere! But... Hmmm... Break out the plans for the vessel I'm turning, transcribe 'em over to the blank and... Wohhoo! My luck is still holding! Every grub hole looks like it'll be turned away in the final form! (Maybe I should run down to the local NewsAgent and buy some tatts tickets? )

Attachment 55980

So I thinks to myself "That's enough for today, tomorrow I'll start on the form" and started cleaning up. But then I thought, "the grain looks nice, maybe I'll just clean it up a tad so I can see it clearly."

Out came the 1" skew again, just lightly touched it to the wood and... *BANG!* But nothing seemed to go UFO...? Shut down the lathe to inspect the wood. It's fine. No sign of a dig in or anything like that. What gives? Start the lathe up again, introduce the skew and it started chattering like the blazes. Then I realised I was bleeding on it...

Have a closer look and... that's not right! I'd snapped the last inch off (no wonder it was chattering!) and gashed the ball of my LH thumb... I think it borke where 'twas resting on the toolrest and my thumb would've been right over it. Didn't feel a thing, until I realised I was leaking!

Attachment 55981

I shut everything down and headed inside to find a band-aid, and on my way out the door noticed the missing piece of skew. Some 15' behind where I was working. Glad I didn't cop that in the face. [Phew!]

And it had been such a good day until then!

[lubbing5cherubs]

Skew Mate, be careful could of been lot worse. I hope the minister of finance will cough enough $$$ to buy yourself a new one
Toni

[Grumpy John]

Skew,
Don't worry about your thumb mate, is the timber still o.k. Priorities mate priorities.

Cheers
GJ

[ss_11000]

geeez. be careful skew.

[rsser]

Holy moley; bummer Skew.

Glad it wasn't worse.

Though after the goblet worm hole on Sunday, you know you've got one more coming don't you

[Skew ChiDAMN!!]

The wood is fine, mate. That's the first thing I checked! Otherwise I'd have used stronger language than "Bother."

In all honesty, the skew was out of one of those cheap'n'nasty chaiwanese sets. I think I paid $30 for 6 chisels quite a few years ago? It has never seen much use, because it doesn't hold an edge. I don't really know why I used it today, except that I was too lazy to unpack my good chisel from the box where I put it after Ern's mini-turnfest. I shoulda known better.

Still, I'm hoping to replace it with some real $teel.

One more to come, Ern? I wish you hadn't mentioned that!

[Calm]

Skew i think this is fate

The thing now is turn a negative into a positive.

You need to carefully explain that as one of your tools has suffered fatigue it is likely to happen to others, with more serious consequences.

I think the argument to the Minister for Finance would be that with the WWW show coming up you have the ideal oportunity to compare and purchase some new tools, probably a couple of skews, several gouges and whatever else you can get away with. (Maybe a bowl saver, or hollowing tool for that special project.)

As someone once said in a song "never let a chance go by"


Lucky escape all the same. Can you weld it up.

[DJ’s Timber]

Glad to hear you only damaged the cheap chaiwanese chisel with only a minor cut on your thumb and with NO damage to the timber

[funkychicken]

Ouch...

I've snapped the end off my spear point before (also cheap and nasty)
Now that was scary...

And as for wounds; once upon a time I punched a peice of eight inch square ply while it was on the lathe. Accidental but still painful

[TTIT]

Lucky - - could have been 2 ex-Skews

[Harry72]

Better get that Lotto ticket Skew(or is that Skew'd)

[wheelinround]

Skew'd n skrewed dude.

glad your not posting this from the hospital bed.

the thumb how is it???

[jmk89]

You could have been Skewered!

[Cliff Rogers]

Bother..... anybody got any good tips for Skew?

[Waldo]

The wood is fine, mate. That's the first thing I checked! Otherwise I'd have used stronger language than "Bother."

G'day Skew,

C'mon mate you only wrote "bother" because Stirlo might read this thread , what you really said was

Where's the blood? I don't see any in the shots there?