This meeting was a bit different to our user professional demonstrations as rather than just being an evening session it covered a full day and was expertly preformed by the international renown woodturner Stuart Mortimer.

Stuart brought a long some examples of his excellent work.	Stuart began his demo by showing how the skew can be used to obtain most shapes when spindle turning.	Next Stuart moved on to show how he marks out his wood to enable him to produce spirals with 2, 4 & 8 degrees of twist. First the work is split length wises according to how many twists one wants to produce.	Next horizontal lines are marked a long the work, this effectively creates many boxes on the work. The appropriate apexes of these boxes are then joined up to show the line the spiral will follow round and a long the work.
Once all the marking out has been completed work can begun to actually cut the spirals. Stuart showed 3 techniques which can be employed to do the cutting. This varied from using manual rasps, to motorised rasps up to using an Arbortech cutter.	Here we see the first of the spirals taking shape using basic tools such as rasps.	Now Stuart is using an Arbortech to speed the process of cutting the spirals.	Using this tool the process of breaking through into to the centre of the spiral is made much easier and quicker.
Once the spiral cutting is complete then a power rasp is used to do an initial clean up of the spirals. Final cleaning and finishing being done using  decreasing grades of finishing paper.	The next item Stuart showed us was a hollow form with spiral cut on the outside.	Here we see the basic shape of the hollow form with the marking which will aid cutting of the spirals.	Here you can clearly see the guide lines for cutting the spirals on the outside of the hollow form.
Mark-up complete Stuart explains how he will cut every line down to about 3/8" and then cut every third one much deeper.	Cutting progresses a pace.	Cutting nearly progressed enough to allow....	the hollowing to be done. Stuart explained although there are many ways hollowing can be done he prefers to use a bowl gouge with slightly altered grind.
The hollowing is complete so now Stuart refines the shape of the form towards what will ultimately become the base.		The spirals being cleaned and slightly refined.	Here Stuart shows how he prevents the base from splitting as it dry out. He grinds small holes in it, then surrounds the base with tape and fills the holes with super glue.
Turning complete the form is now allowed to dry before final finishing.	Next item begins to take shape, i.e. a goblet turned from walnut.	The bowl is complete and gets it finishing coat.	The stem is turned to its required diameter and the foot shape is being refined.
The spirals on the stem have been marked out and cutting them begins.	The nearly completed spirals can clearly been seen here.	Cutting the spirals complete, Stuart shows how he uses his "special tools" ☺ to finish the spirals.	The completed goblet.
Stuart's next item is going to be  a small vase with a lace effect round the rim.	Think this is some holiday-maker who just wandered in off the street!	The shape of the vase has been achieved so now Stuart drills  holes round the rim which will be opened up to give the lace effect.	As the wood is slightly wetter than Stuart would like he uses some tissue and applies pressure to the rotating edge to generate heat and drive out some of the moisture.
The lace effect can now clearly be seen taking shape.	The small rasp comes out to refine the lace edge.	Stuart now working on another hollow form, which this time will not cut with spirals but will have walls so thin that they'll transmit light.	The outside has the desired shape and the inside hollowing has progressed to the point where light begins to show though the walls.
Slowly the inside shape is refined and the light used to show where more wood needs to be removed.	Just about there as the light showing though the wall takes on a uniform glow across the piece.	Stuart starts work on the last piece of his excellent days demonstration. Here we see the marking out for what will become one of his "pig-tail" spirals.	The Arbortech comes out again to sped cutting the of the spiral.
The power rasp being used to clean up the spiral.			The spirals have been cut and cleaned up now the piece is spun up again and the outside shape refined.

And so ended a very interesting and informative demonstration by Stuart, I've only been a member of the club a couple of years but this was certainly the best demonstration I've seen. Hopefully some club members will try some of the techniques Stuart showed us on their entries in the clubs November open competition.

The club thanks Wightlink for sponsoring Stuart's trip to the island to give this demonstration.