A Lute - at last

Finally, I justify the name of the blog.

This is a lute.

Go on, look it up in your dictionary. It is, by definition, a lute. Sure it doesn't look much like the picture from medieval England of the King's lute-player, with a multi-stringed instument, with a weird bent-back peg-board.

It's more in the historical line of middle Eastern or even Chinese lutes, which pre-date the Pommie version by quite a few centuries.But I can't really claim it's that either, it's just a thing that grew out of the wood, like a wood-turned mushroom.

technically: 4 stringed, (bronze wire), strung to zither pins at both ends, sound chamber is a turned bowl of pinus radiata, rod is glue laminated jarrah/cypress pine.

It is non-fretted.

One night I was worrying about how to fix the fret-board, when a voice boomed out of the night sky, and said "Dooooon't fret!"

So I didn't.


But I'm thinking the voice may have misled me, because the lute would be more useful as a musical instrument if it was fretted, so I'm thinking about fitting a fret-board.

Or perhaps make another lute next year, fixing all the mistakes that I currently pass off as design features, and make that one a proper fretted lute.
We will see.

All the best from vsquared

Rest in peace. Scott

An old mate died recently. Because one tends to feel pretty useless at times like that I offered to make an Urn for his ashes.

It ended in 3 urns, not one. The lower photo is the main one.

I'm not entirely happy about any of them, but I did my best.

New guinea rosewood, finished with Rustins plastic.

All three made from the one rather umipressive branch, so at least it was a good use of resources.

Bowls - not bad actually

Top picture - black wattle bowl - very simple but timber is beautiful Nice colour and grain, hey.

Pictures 2 and 3 - bowl - domesticus robusticus - also known as hard timber I found lying around at home.

Colourful pens

Pen blanks from man made material can make interesting pens.

Certainly people seem to like them.

But it'll never replace wood, as far as enjoying the process of turning goes.

The reddish brown one, all by itself, is red gum.

Bowls - different shapes, sizes, timbers

Three new bowls, none of them quite finished.

I'm in the throes of re-inventing the lute, (or one of its many forms), and each of these bowls started out as a sound-bowl or part of a sound chamber for the lutes (there are to be two).

In the photo with three bowls, the one on front left. New Guinea Rosewood, was to be a sound-bowl, i.e no lid, but it has gradually lost favour and will probably end up just a bowl, for peanuts and popcorn perhaps.

The dark one at the back, Darwin black wattle, was to be the bottom of the sound chamber for lute no. 2, but it also is probably not going to get the job.

The one on the right, pinus radiata, is now favourite to be the open sound bowl, and the sound chamber will probably also be in pinus. I have two blanks prepared for the sound chamber, and with luck will turn them this coming weekend.

Why all the changes? Probably I'm not good at planning, and projects get made up as we go along. Change is inevitable. Sometimes, change is good. Sometimes, its just easier to change than to finish what we started.

The lonely photo in the left corner is the black wattle. We have been fighting for two weeks now, as it really did not want to become a bowl, and declared it was willing to self-destruct at 2500rpm if necessary.

But I was too clever for it, and although it is now 20% glue, we have declared an honourable draw, and it is a bowl.

(NB It is not yet finished, and if you look closely it is still in the chuck, destined to go back on the lathe within a couple of days. Hara-kiri is still possible. I will report further. For those who are interested in detail, the finish is olive oil, and looks great. I'll keep up the oiling until saturation is reached.)

all the best

vsquared

A very small piece of Penola redgum meets its fate

The previous post features a sizeable lump of Penola redgum.

I left most of it in Aldinga, but smuggled a sliver home in my hand luggage. (Photo)

I then cut it in half, and the result is a clock insert, as you can see.

What is interesting from a woodturning point of view is that the timber, which had not been neatly cut but just rough-split, could not, due to the rough and broken surface, be turned down to a nice, neat item.

I turned it to a round, more or less, but retained much of the broken, split, damaged surface.

Whether it is a successful piece I'm not sure. But it is interesting, and I had fun with it.

I have another little piece, which might get a similar treatment. Not sure yet.

The photos aren't terrific, but if you douoble click and enlarge them you'll get a better view of what I've described.

All the best

vsquared.

Acquiring timber, honestly

Recently we went holidaying, and drove many miles. First stop was Penola, and pretty and friendly town with an unfortunate climate.

But its climate, wet and cold, makes for beautiful timber.

We did the touristy thing, looking through some old and historic cottages, built of timber slabs, plus whatever else they had to hand. It was genuinely interesting.

Stacked, ready for burning in the open fire, was a collection of local timber. I confessed to the kind lady who who had opened the cottage that I had a shameful habit, i.e. reducing perfectly good timber to shavings, and please ma'am could I have a piece of your firewood.

"Poor doddering old fool" she thought. But what she said was, "Sure, help yourself".

So I did, to a big lump of Penola redgum. Most of which now resides in a shed in Aldinga, waiting for a fellow wood butcher to have 'a nidea'. A little bit followed me home to Darwin, and I'll post a photo soon that will reveal its fate.