What an evening with which to kick off our Hands On nights in 2026. We had over 60 members and visitors come along and get involved on the night!! So thank you all for making it another great evening.
To start the evening, Club Chairman, Richard Pinches, presented Club President, John Smith and Vice President, Mike Delves with their Honorary Membership certificates. We had unanimously voted to make them Life Members at our AGM in recognition of their hard work and contribution to the club over many years.
Mike also stood down as Club Chairman in January so Richard also presented him with a gift from the club to recognise his tireless service and contribution as Chairman.
With the formalities over, we moved onto the main part of the night with members getting the opportunity to have a go on the club lathes and to talk through ideas and techniques.
On our new and inexperienced members lathe, Mike Delves guided members through turning a mushroom. Mike had members queuing up all night and they were still turning mushrooms at the end of the evening. Following on from Mike Taylors demonstration in November, Trevor had the club pole lathe set up to give members the chance to try their hand at the old fashioned way of turning (prior to the electric motor). It was good to see how many people had a go and found out how different the technique is to turning on a modern lathe. Finally, we had Jeff Griffin on the third lathe covering finishing techniques. Jeff had a lot of interest, and members shared their own hints and tips during the evening.
In addition to the lathes, we also had Tom Phoenix running his sharpening school. It is always important that we have sharp tools and Tom is an expert at grinding tools back to an edge, so being able to share that experience with members is very much welcome. Tom also explains different grinds and the best way to achieve these at home.
As if all of that was not enough, we had the club raffle and members work table as well. A big thank you to Joy and Peter for running the raffle on the night, all the proceeds go towards supporting the club in the events that we attend.
Here are a few more photographs from the night:
Our next Hands On evening is in May so keep your eyes peeled to see what we have planned for the night.