Mark's Musings
Mark Bronkalla
August Meeting
As a group we are very oriented towards “natural”
finishes. Tom Monahan of General Finishes did a great job of showing
off the “dark side” of finishing painted finishes. To an amateur wood
worker, the fact that well over 60% of commercial furniture is painted
finishes is astonishing. With samples in hand of a nice
variety, Tom showed us some of the possibilities. For me, this really
has me thinking.
With several of our rooms done in dark woods such as
cherry, mixing in painted pieces offers an opportunity to lighten
things up while maintaining the “cherry set” , etc. I was very
impressed with the quality of finish that could be had without needing
to resort to spraying. Workshops and Seminars At the meeting we
also had a discussion of workshops, pricing and accessibility for the
general membership (cost). I will try to explain the current thoughts
on how and why we price the workshops and activities as we do. I am
sure this is not the end of the discussion.
As a guild we have several types of key activities.
Unfortunately we have naming conventions that overlap categories. I
think revising and formalizing the offerings will help with the members
understanding what we are trying to do in each. I want to incorporate
the comments form the group in my column for this month's newsletter if
possible.
- Regular meetings - normally with a presentation by key speaker
(yes it seems obvious)
- Key speaker /author meetings. These are similar to the regular
meetings, but with a speaker that has been brought in (with the
attendant additional expenses). These meetings are often set up for a
Friday evening so that they can back up to a weekend workshop / seminar
by the same presenter.
- Workshops - Normally thought of as a "hands on", where the
participants make something or practice techniques. Workshops will
typically either require the attendees to bring materials (and tools)
or will have a materials fee assessed. At the end of the workshop the
attendees have a project or some sample work. The project may is more
often than not complete at the end of the workshop. Workshops are
typically small groups (8-12 or maybe 20 people). The stock and
material preparation work required for a workshop can be substantial.
sometimes taking the instructor and helpers more time than then actual
class.
- Seminars - These have been also called workshops in the past. In
a seminar, the instructor is doing the teaching and the attendees are
watching and generally not doing hands on operations. These are
actually the majority of what we have called workshops in the past. The
class size for seminars ranges form small (8-10) to quite large 40-50.
The take away from these sessions may be some hand-outs, but is more
often just the attendees notes. With seminars put on by an outside
speaker / author, there are often books, supplies and other materials
for sale by the presenter. These are offered by the presenter with no
profit taken on these items by the guild. The books offered are often
the attendees opportunity to get them signed by the author.
- Toy / charity building sessions. In these sessions, members will
get together at a sponsors shop and build a batch of a project. The
idea of these sessions is to do some "production building" of a
quantity of an item. There is typically not a formal instructional
segment other than how to follow the instructions for the particular
project.
- Logfest - Logfest is a category by itself. Logfest is a group
activity where the goals are: a) Make lumber available to members at a
very attractive price b) Give members an opportunity to
experience lumber production and drying c) Make book matched and log
matched lumber available for projects (plus spectacular wild figured
and spalted wide planks) - wood that is just not available at a
rational price commercially if at all, and d) Make some money for the
guild (hopefully). The guild fronts the money for logs (preferably
free), transportation and saw cutting time. The hope is that we can
turn a profit at the end even with the very low auction sale prices
that we have seen in the past (last year the average price was ~$1 per
board foot) The gathering / saw team is given considerable
leeway in setting how the lumber is cut and it is an interesting and
interactive process to get the best yield from a log. It has been
suggested that we open / cross promote Logfest to the wood turners,
carvers or other local groups. I think this is a good idea. It will
provide some cross pollination of ideas and in many cases what is not
great furniture lumber, may be a great turning or carving blank.
- Specialty workshops such as the upcoming demonstration workbench.
These do not neatly fit in any of the above categories. The workbench
workshop is most like a seminar. Think of it being a class where the
demonstration materials become a functional object at the end. My
recommendation (and Dick’s as well) is that the guild purchase the
materials out of our general funds (probably $500-600) and the attendee
prices match the normal. I would really like to do the workbench as a
round-robin but need some others to offer shop space and time. I will
do a better write-up for it and post some pictures / plans so that we
can gather comments and gain interest. This should be a late fall -
winter series.
- Shop fees and tool reimbursement: Normally we do not pay for
workshop space. Sometimes we have to rent space for the larger
workshops (e.g. for the Jeff Jewitt classes at the senior center). In
case with Matt's generous offers of free use for workshops, I think we
should help at least pay for the heat as I am sure his expense for that
is substantial. Machine wear is normally not significant. Cutters and
blades that are ruined in the course of a class should be reimbursed.
(typically, items used for a production run). Instructors are
reimbursed for material expenses. In many cases the instructors have
donated the materials for the demos. Another goal of the
workshops and seminars should be to make some money. I think the
current fee structure of $25 for half day / evening and $45 for full
day is about right. Compared to commercial classes this is a great
bargain (1/2 to 1/3 the price) and with proper class sizes we make
money even with instructors that are brought in. If we simply set them
for break even we will end up losing money when we do not fill the
sessions. I think one of the group goals is to keep the
meetings free (no additional charges above the dues). This is unlike
other clubs which charge door fees when they bring in keynote speakers.
The associated weekend workshops go a long way to subsidizing the
monthly meeting. We are on the way to financial health with
the checking account balance growing (year over year) and membership
growing as well. We face substantial outlays each year for rental, the
party, speakers and Logfest. We need a good sized balance to make sure
we can cover the coming year's expenses. We have no ability to raise
money at the last minute if we have a shortfall and do not want to be a
"deadbeat guild" that cancels speakers due to lack of funds. If
we find that we have a large surplus, there are several avenues of
using it a free bonus seminar with a name speaker or purchase of
materials for toys or other charity projects.(and Library items, Ed.).
Need Help
For Logfest, George Henderson is doing the sawing this year with an
awesome new band saw mill. The normal sawing times are 2-7 PM on
Fridays. We need 4-6 people each Friday. To lift and haul. The planks
need to be taken from the mil and stacked and stickered. The planks are
in the range of 50-75 lbs each. We need 2-3 teams of 2 people. Sign up
is not required , but appreciated. Contact Ken Barr, George Henderson,
Ron Hinderman, or Ron Smeaton for more details. You can bring teen age
kids (my son David has enjoyed it) to help as well. Younger kids
are not quite aware enough of the dangers. We need to find
a way to increase the number of people that are teaching the workshops
and participating in running the Guild activities. We need some more
team leaders / cheerleaders to help drive this. One of my ideas is to
have the board members and anyone who teaches a for fee workshop (8
person minimum) get free membership the following year. Harder to
judge is providing free membership for significant committee work (such
as Ron , Bill and Ken for Logfest). Any comments? I would like to have
this as a discussion at the September meeting
Need new President !
will be stepping down as president at the end of this year. My
work demands have grown a lot in the last year and it is limiting the
time and energy that I have available. We need to find a new President
soon and we should also get the Toy chairman position properly filled.
Hopefully most of the board will be staying on. Lets have a few more
members step up and join the board and the committees. We are
completely dependent on volunteer leaders - no leaders - no Guild..
I still want to teach seminars and workshops as I really
get a kick out of doing that and the sporadic schedule can be better
accommodated.
In The Shop:
One significant project in the last month. We made some wind chimes and
dog dishes. Yes, not fine furniture but they sure were fun.
We vacation with another family, friends of ours from New Jersey each
year. The schedule basically alternates between east coast and Midwest
every other year. When the gang is here we do a project of some sort.
Given that wood turning is easy to learn, (at least the basics), this
has been a central part of several projects.
This year the project was a set of wind chimes. We have a nice set of
chimes based on plans from the barbershop newsgroup. Go to the end of: http://arneberg.com/harmonet/threads/wind
chimes.html . Our friends wanted some like them, but
bigger and made from aluminum, rather than copper. Aluminum
tubing / pipe is not a hardware store item, and the prices from Metal
Express were too steep. So we fell back on Pal Steel in Palmyra to see
what they had in salvage / surplus. They had some nice long pieces of
2.25” diameter aluminum pipe. This definitely fit the bill as “bigger”
than my 1” copper set.
Tuning the chimes offers a challenge, but with the help from the wind
chimes construction group on yahoo, help is at hand, see: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/windchimeconstruction/.
For tuning info see: http://www1.iwvisp.com/cllsj/wind
chimes/length.htm. This tuning calculator was amazingly
accurate. If you want to see how close you really are, there are a
number of tuning programs, some oriented to piano or bell tuning. I
like Musebook tuner:
http://www.musebook.com/?page=mbtuner. The demo is free and the
real price at $28 is pretty darn cheap. For these large
chimes, we made the tops from white cedar - some huge planks I
got at last year’s Logfest. The Cedar is 3” thick and turns easily.
Great for beginning turners on large pieces. The top for the
chimes was 3” thick with a diameter of 18”. This was made form a
single piece - no glue up (such are the benefits of buying an entire
thick sawn log). We also did some dog dishes as a side project,
(roughly rectangular with the bowl hollowed out on the lathe) -
20’ and 22” diagonals. The chimes tuned out great. The
tubing was cut on the power miter box / chop saw (wear eye and ear
protection and long sleeves. The tubes are suspended on 75lb test
Spider Wire fishing line ( very thin - darn near invisible from a
distance). The chimes were over 5 ‘ tall overall and over 50 lbs
complete. We turned the clapper out of HDPE slightly oversize to dampen
the sound a little and avoid police visits (yes, the chimes are loud
and ring a long time).
Program
For
current calendar information see:
http://wiscwoodworkersguild.org/cgi-bin/eventcalendar.cg
Raffle Column
Alan
Clapp
The September raffle item is a raised panel cutter set
donated by Woodline USA. Woodline USA can be reached at
800-472-6950,
www.woodbits.com, 111 Wheeler Street,
LaVergne, TN 37086.
Reflections
Tom Monohan - General Finishes "Paint"
Leila Crandall-Frink
We were fortunate once again, to have Tom Monahan of General Finishes
speak to the guild. Tom brought his wife, Debbie with him. Just when we
thought we had heard everything there was to know about finishing our
wood projects, Tom talked about painting furniture. There
is a lot to learn about the difference in stained and finished pieces
and in painted pieces. Tom said that 70 to 75% of furniture being
manufactured today is painted. If you are furniture shopping in today’s
market, you need to look to find wood tones. The painted furniture is
the more commonplace to find. He stated that today black and white
paint has taken over the market. By painting their pieces,
manufacturers can make furniture using cheaper wood, such as MDF,
Aspen, and Pine. Last year General Finishes made 6-8 colors
of paint. This year they added 6 new colors and expect to add many more
in the future. Now you can find 50 wood tone colors. In the next few
years you will be able to find over 100 colors and perhaps less wood
tone colors. There are several interesting differences when
painting a piece. Paint itself is a finish coat. When staining wood,
you still need to add a coating. Danish oil does not provide a hard
film. A varnish used over Danish oil will seal it and provide a hard
coat. Paint forms a film (coat) and is finished. With paint, it dries
faster, has low odor and is easy to clean up. You can brush or spray on
paint. Either works well.
It cleans up easily with soap and water. You apply paint
by laying on 2-3 thick heavy coats and add a clear finish coat of
sheen. Paint is compatible with stain.
You can paint over the top of a stained piece. You can paint
over stained and varnished woods. You just need to sand down smooth and
maybe use a primer. If you are not sure are not sure what the original
finish is, use 100% acrylic to get the best coverage and durability.
From a manufacturing standpoint, paint takes longer to
make. Varnish can be made in 45 minutes, while paint takes 2 to 3 hours
to make. That is because paint is acrylic, a synthetic petroleum based
product. It uses a lot of different petroleum products to have it be
soap and water clean up.
From a durability standpoint, oil based varnishes are extremely
durable; the piece will look the same in 50 years, provided it does not
have years of wax and dirt buildup. Water based finishes have the ease
of clean up, but are still very durable.
Tom said that acrylic paint is child safe when dry. The paint is
then inert and a child can gnaw on it and it will not hurt the child.
After the break, Tom demonstrated a few different ways to
apply interesting effects using paint. He put a burnt umber glaze over
a terra cotta red; then wiped off the burnt umber, leaving a nicely
darkened terra cotta. It emulates old varnish. He also showed it over a
yellow paint and created a wood grain effect using tools made
especially for that. The tools are available at stores. Both effects
were finished with a clear coat. They were amazingly beautiful.
Tom also passed out samples of wood painted to look like
marble and burls. He showed how to make a piece with a crackle applied.
He explained that it had a hide glue function, but is a
synthetic.
The crackle was applied 2 hours earlier. When the new paint was
put on, it starts to crackle almost immediately. However, it is a
chemical reaction and the result is random, you cannot control the
reaction. Finally, Tom told how he does a final finish on
any piece when done. He applies a thin coat of satin finishing wax, and
dries for 2-3 days. Then he takes a very fine grain sanding pad (foam
pad), adds wet wax on it and very, very lightly sands the piece.
He does not disturb the finish that is on. After 5 minutes he
takes a clean paper towel and lightly rubs the piece. This takes off
any surface imperfections and leaves the piece with a hand rubbed
effect. As a kind gesture, Tom offered some cans of finish
to the evening participants. Thank you Tom & Debbie Monahan for an
informative evening, and for perhaps giving some of us the courage to
paint a project. Note: Please do not try any of the ideas presented in
this write up without getting professional advise on how to do them.
Toy Drive 2004
Ron Hinderman (2003 Toy Chairman)
Hi folks! It's now getting close to December 2004 and time to
think
seriously about the Holiday Toy Drive. How are you doing on making toys?
Maybe some folks could bring
samples of what they have already made. We need dolls & teddy bears
because
a few of us Guild members will be
making doll strollers and cradles, and we need some nice dolls &
teddy bears
to put in them. If you haven’t already started making toys, this is the
time
to get started. The shelters and the families in them appreciate so
much the
quality and quantity of donated toys we have made in the past years.
Thank
you so much for the wonderful job you have done.