See you in september!

Hello people! This is the last video of the season! A big thank you from me and Scrapy for being here, another year. See you again in September with more woodworking videos! Until then enjoy the rest of the summer! :)

Green jewel scarab beetle in epoxy resin

Tools and materials I propose:

Lathe

Wood turning tools set

Vacuum chamber kit

Sanding adapter

Hot glue gun

Micro mesh sanding pads

Buffing kit

I found this beetle dead on the street. It kind of inspired me to dip it in resin and make something with it on the woodturning lathe. So, I glued it with epoxy on a scrap piece of beech with some wood savings. This kept it from floating in the resin. I enjoyed this project so much, that I think I am gonna make a series of similar projects with different insect species!

The scrap beech piece was from another woodturning project, so it already fitted my chuck jaws. I cut the plastic from an old bottle and wrapped it around my piece with transparent tape. I sealed it with hot glue. And my mold was ready.

Next I mixed some slow setting clear resin and casted it into the mold. I degassed the resin in my vacuum chamber a few times, to remove as many bubbles as I could. 

And after about three days, my blank was ready. Resin seems to turn really nicely with scrapers. So I did most of my shaping with my round scraper. To shape the wooden part I used a spindle gouge, a skew chisel and my knife shaped parting tool.

I sanded the piece beginning with 100grit. At 500 I started wet sanding with water until 1000grit. I then moved to polishing with my micro mesh sanding pads. 

I parted the piece off the lathe and sanded the bottom using a sanding adapter on the lathe. 

I then buffed the piece using my polishing wheels. I used the two finer wheels, because micro mesh had created a really clear surface. 

And my little beetle was ready! I really enjoyed this project although it was relatively simple! Anyway I hope you liked it because that was it, see you soon with a new project video!

Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, meaning, that at no cost to you, I get a small commission if you click through and make a purchase.

Making a birdhouse on the lathe - Woodturning

Tools and materials I propose:

Lathe

Wood turning tools set

Forstner bit set

Caliper set

Cordless drill

Chuck kit

Heat gun

To make this birdhouse I used olive wood and apricot wood. I also used my hook tool for the first time, in order to hollow the endgrain core of the house.

First of all I used my electric chainsaw to cut an olive wood log to rough size. I then mounted it on the lathe between centers and trued it up with a roughing gouge. The lathe was set at it’s lowest speed to reduce the vibrations of the unbalanced piece. 

I filled the cracks with wood glue and wood chips.

Using a flat beading tool and my skew chisel I created a dovetailed tenon to fit my chuck’s jaws. 

I then chucked the blank and shaped the exterior using a spindle gouge. 

To hollow the interior I again lowered the speed of the lathe. I used a forstner bit to remove material from the core. This was engrain hollowing and olive wood is pretty hard. So I tried a new tool for this job. It’s called hook tool. It’s is a pretty dangerous tool so I took it really slow to try to find the sweet spots on which the tool cut. This worked out nicely but slowly. Every now and then I came back with the forstner bit to remove material. When I finished with the hook, I cleaned the cut marks with a round side scraper. 

Back on the exterior again I used a skew to even things up. I also drilled the entrance hole with a forstner bit. Finally I parted the piece off using a spindle gouge, the skew and a handsaw. 

I flipped the piece over and chucked it with my bowl bottom jaws. I used a spindle gouge to clean the bottom of my birdhouse. I also drilled the hole for the dowel on which the bird stands.

The roof of my house is made out of apricot wood. I used a bowl gouge, a skew and a beading tool to shape it. Basically the roof has a male tenon which is glued on the body. It also has a small hanger from which you can hang the birdhouse. 

Again using apricot I made the small dowel on which the bird rests. I mostly used the skew to shape it. I glued the dowel in place. 

I finished my house with three coats of clear, water based, satin varnish. I sanded between coats with 220grit. I used my heat gun to speed up the drying process. 

My little birdhouse came out nice. I hope you’ve enjoyed this project, because that was it, see you soon with a new project video.

Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, meaning, that at no cost to you, I get a small commission if you click through and make a purchase.