It was a pleasure to welcome Simon Hope for his first demonstration at Burcot Woodturners. As many of you know, Mick Hanbury was due to be our guest demonstrator, but when Mick couldn’t make it Simon stepped in to help. We could not have asked for a more experienced and talented replacement!!
With a demonstrator of Simon’s calibre, it was good to see the Village Hall packed with members, visitors and friends. Indeed we were pleased to welcome members of Tudor Rose Woodturners to Burcot for the first time.
For his demonstration, Simon chose to show us how to turn a beaded box with a pewter insert and a finial. He started the demo by melting his pewter so that he could make the insert. This process was new to most members, and showed us a new technique for decorating our work. It will be interesting to see how many members give this new technique a go.
Once the pewter was cooling in the mould Simon had turned he moved his attention to his beaded box.
Simon explained every step so that everyone could understand the process, and had soon turned the outer form of his box. His next step was to add the beading to the outside. Using his beading tool, Simon demonstrated the correct way to use the tool to successfully to achieve the beading on the outside of the box.
Once the beading on the outside was completed, Simon hollowed out the interior of the box.
Following a break for refreshments, Simon began work on turning the pewter insert that he had previously poured in the mould. It was interesting to see how Simon actually turned and textured the pewter using normal woodturning chisels due to the soft nature of the metal.
Once the pewter had been shaped and textured Simon turned his attention to turning the lid of his box. As you would expect he again made this look simple but shared his hints, tips and techniques with the audience.
The final part of the demonstration was to quickly turn the finial and then bring the pieces of the box together.
It was a great demonstration by a master of his craft, and I am sure that it will have inspired a number of members to have a go and the techniques demonstrated.
Whilst this was Simon’s first demonstration at the club I hope that he will be able to return in the near future for another enthralling demonstration.
Here are just a few more photographs from the evening.
