Inland Northwest Woodturners

WHAT: Deep hollowing demonstration.

WHO: Our very own member Don S, who has turned deeper than most.

WHEN: Thursday, August 5. Regular club meeting starts at 6:30 PM with announcements, show-n-tell, discussions. The demo will start at 7 PM-ish.

WHERE: In your comfy lounge chair, with your tiny screen propped in front of you, beverages at hand. Yes, ZOOM, of course! But notice this: in-person meetings will begin in September! A hybrid format will continue for those who still benefit from the remote connection.

HOW: The ZOOM code will be sent by Email to all members.

Our order of Anchorseal and CA glue is in. If you have pre-ordered you will be contacted  regarding pick up arrangements.   Be patient, we will get this done soon.

August 5: Don Scott on deep hollowing

Sept 2: Demonstration on basic bowl-turning

Oct 7: Tim Cox on photographing turned items

November 4: Cindy Drozda. See more about her on her website

December 2: Holiday party!

This is a call to all INW members to consider volunteering to mentor Ferris High School students in woodturning during their morning woodshop periods.  We need volunteers to help one morning a week at Ferris, from 8 AM to 12 PM.  We assist the students turning on various size lathes and projects, while imparting safety techniques. The students are all eager to learn and make something they can take home.

Ferris has an awesome wood shop, with 5 wood lathes and 3 pen-turning lathes as well as a large complement of table saws, band saws, routers, dust-collection, miter saws, drill presses, jointers, CNC machines and more.  We can use all the tools, as needed.

The school is located on the corner of Regal and 37^th on the South Hill of Spokane – with easy parking.  

Please consider helping this great program.  We cannot continue this vital role in our community without extra support.  If you cannot do every week, we hope to integrate your commitment with that of others and get the program well covered.

This is a sanctioned activity of the Inland Northwest Woodturners, and liability coverage is provided as a volunteer in a District 81 program, as well as for INW.

Please contact:
Ron Valley 509-270-3064, or rvalley@comcast.net

No doubt about it, ZOOM meetings have been a valuable personal connection and technical learning asset throughout the past year of hunkering down. They have also helped us bridge what otherwise might have been a frustrating change in our monthly evening meeting and Saturday morning mentoring sessions when we lost the Woodcraft store as a gathering place. Changes in the store's ownership resulted in a long gap in its availability, and this is still the case. However...

As a thank-you for our contribution to the Ferris High School woodworking program (see paragraph elsewhere on this page), we have been offered use of their woodshop for BOTH our monthly meetings and our Saturday workshops.  We hope to go to in-person sessions starting in early September at Ferris, unless county codes for CoVid change and District 81 needs to go into a more conservative mode again.

Those who have been volunteering to mentor student woodturners at Ferris have earned the appreciation of the school's administration as well as from us, because their efforts have garnered this tremendous opportunity for our club. We are homeless no more; seeya this Fall!

Some pictures of the wrong and right way to use a chuck with jaws for mounting with a tenon (compression mode) or a recess (expansion mode). The base of jaws are not manufactured to be flat and in true to each other.  Only the top of the jaws are machined flat and true.

With Damon's approval, these pictures are from our June Third Saturday with Damon demonstration and discussion session.  Turn out was very good and the session was valuable to all!  Lots of core turning and equipment advice learned from experience.  Avoid making the mistakes that most of us do, and pick up the pearls of the trade in short order!  Members will receive a link before the next Third Saturday sessions.

Just search for Inland Northwest Woodturners.

Now connecting with more than 6,000 woodturners around the world, lathe- and tool-maker Record Power is offering a series of live educational programs for the price of… nuthin'.

You will only need to register once at www.recordpowertv.com to receive your automatic notifications and Login Codes for each live session.

Several INW members have watched various sessions and thoroughly enjoyed them. Many little nuggets of information useful to beginner and intermediate turners alike.

Theo Haralampou is the usual demonstrator and he usually includes:

• Timber selection, grain orientation
• Tools and techniques
• Finding form
• Appropriate finishes

Some of our members have been working hard gathering lots of logs for cutting and distribution.  We picked up a huge pair of elm trunks.  Stay tuned for the next distribution day! We will definitely have elm (Also maple, some cherry, maybe some locust).

I

FOG is a technical term meaning "Found On Ground" and is a source of great delight to woodturners everywhere. If anyone has, or knows of some good turning trees that are down and could be harvested, let any Board member know and we will look into it for a club cutting.  We have gotten many truckloads of beautiful turning timber in the past (see Photo Album page).  Wood gathering that is a club sanctioned event requires at least one Officer of the Board to be present during the event.  Additionally it is not allowed to fell any trees (on private or public property) as a part of INW.   You may do so on your own if you desire but at your own risk and liability.  These rules are in conformity with the club's insurance coverage requirements.  

The wildly popular "Lend-a-Lathe" Program is designed primarily for new turners getting started on their woodturning experience. Currently a Rikon Midi  and a Jet Midi are in the program, with an initial 3 month loan period for members.  For questions, applications and supporting materials contact Damon, the program director. His contact information is on the Members page     

Are you watching your little phone or tablet screen to join our meetings and demos on Zoom? Do you have a smart TV that would be so much easier to see the program on? Well, there is good news: you can! Ron Gooley recommended we post instructions for a simple procedure to "cast" (yeah, like fishing) the Zoom meeting from your phone, tablet, or laptop to your smart TV. A PDF document is posted in the Skill Center: click it and read or download the instructions. Sit back and enjoy turning on the big screen.

Members should be receiving emails from us regularly. IF YOU ARE NOT getting Emails, we do not have a working email address for you!  Please contact us at:

contact-us  to provide your preferred active Email address.  Also, please check your SPAM folder to see if our mass Emails are going automatically to your SPAM or junk folder.

Non-members are welcome to subscribe and receive the newsletter by Email. Just enter your Email address in the box below, and click "Subscribe." We do not use or sell your information for any other purpose than the newsletter. Members need not subscribe.  They will automatically receive an Email notice when the latest newsletter is published on the web site. 

AAW’s 2021 Symposium will be VIRTUAL. The AAW Board has cancelled the Omaha event, but options will be announced later on how to enjoy front-row seats from home or shop. Safety in the midst of a still fluid pandemic is the reason. AAW will be using an enhanced virtual event software platform to offer multiple concurrent live demonstration tracks (with access after the conference to all recordings), a virtual trade show, a virtual Instant Gallery, live and silent auctions, special interest topics, drawings, and more. The only thing missing will be the handshakes and hugs from old and new woodturning friends. You will need to wait one more year for that.

Our video and book library is housed at the Riverview Retirement Center where we hold/held our monthly Saturday open community turning and learning sessions. Items in the library are/were available for check out by our members. Each video or book has a sign out card.  We make them available for self help, sign out and sign back in when done.  The library materials are great to borrow, read or watch! This service will resume when the meetings resume; in the meantime there are multiple sources of good turning information on the internet and through club membership.