Back on the chess boards

Tuesday, at lunchtime, I went home and tried to turn a couple of chess pieces. I had a short block of cherry, 2" by 2" by about 5" long. Using a "head to head" turning technique, I thought I could make 2 pawns out of that. So I put it in the lathe and turned the cherry round. Then I started shaping the pawns according to the plan.

Remember me saying that I am not good at using a lathe? Well, I demonstrated this once again. Things seemed to be going ok for a little while. Then the parts broke apart in the middle. You know how when you and someone else pull on the legs of a wishbone and one of you gets the bigger part? Well, that is what happened, sort of. It broke in a way that I couldn't salvage 1 of them, for sure.

I understand what I did wrong and know what I will try for the next time. What I SHOULD be doing is turning the largest diameters first and gradually working down to the smaller diameters. But what I did was start small and work outward to the larger diameters. That made the "dowel", mounted in the lathe, "weak".

So I put turning on hold until I have a nice warm evening...hopefully next week.


Today, during lunch, I went home and decided to do something that is within my grasp. Finish making the chess boards. Newcomers to my blog may not recall the fiasco of January 2005, see that post here, (thirteen months ago already?) that caused me to put the chess boards on hold. Strips of wood have been waiting patiently on a shelf. Time to work on them again.

So I planed the NEW pieces (1/4 inch thick by EXACTLY 2 inches wide). Then took them into the basement where it is warmer and within temperature for the glue (55F or higher). I glued up 4 pairs of 2 strips each...1 poplar and 1 cherry. When that is set, those 4 pairs will be glued into 2 pairs of 4 strips each (poplar cherry poplar cherry). Then 1 set of 8 strips (a picture later will demonstrate how this works).

That will look like a striped kitchen cutting board of 8 colored strips. This will be turned 90 degrees and cut into 8 strips again (where I messed up 13 months ago). Every other strip will be turned end for end, then glued together in pairs again (as above). That will leave the checkerboard pattern...you'll see.

Anyway, I made nice progress, and THIS time there is no JERK looking over my shoulder.