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It's been three weeks since my last entry, mainly due to lack of anything interesting to write about, until the last couple of days when everything become busy again. I have finally finished work for a whole month, which I intend to make the most of. The first interesting event has been the felling and thinning of the spinney behind our house by a friendly group of council arborists who were only to glad to let me have as much wood as I could carry.
Some sycamore logs awaiting splitting...
Tools for splitting. Interestingly these were all bought at car boot sales for pennies. However they are excellent for splitting large logs with a minimum of effort.
This large piece of pine makes an excellent chopping block. It enables one to work without bending down and allows the use of an axe without the sharp edge coming into contact with the ground.
These are some ash poles I managed to obtain which I intend to use on the pole lathe once it's up and running.
A nice pile of logs, split, drying and mostly ready to burn.
This is one of the metal centres inserted into the pole lathe poppets. The point was made by steadily grinding on an electric grindstone. Each poppets contains a centre and it's important that they are both centred. The second one I made needed regrinding as the point was initially made off centre.
The left hand poppet has the nut recessed into the wooden poppet as the rod is moveable, allowing it to be tightened against the workpiece by means of a handle on the other end of the rod, as in the following image:
That's it for now. I just have to attach the legs, which have already been cut and shaped, and it should be ready to use.
All the best!
