Guild News

Our passion is to create memorable items from the wide range of both native and exotic timbers available in New Zealand, and to share our skills with others such as yourself.

Demonstration Day – Saturday 27th June

Today the hard work of the committee preparing for this demonstration day culminated in a highly successful event.

The day kicked off to a packed hall with many visitors as well as a high turnout of members.

Fred Irvine got the ball rolling with a fascinating trip down memory lane with a demonstration of the evolution of wood lathes over the last 150 years. He showed us his precious collection of some of these lathes of various sizes which were propelled by treadles. Some of these Fred had repaired with parts he made himself, demonstrating the broad range of his skills.

Later in the day he demonstrated examples of his work with ornamental turning and thread turning using jigs and and tools, most of which he had designed and made himself.

Roger Dean shared with us his love of carving, whittling and the ornamental decoration of his work. He kindly handed out a detailed description of ‘how to’ carve a chain, and ball in a cage.

His bowl covered with hand carved ‘dragon scales’ was truly a thing of beauty, and clearly many painstaking hours had gone into producing it.

A scrumptious lunch was put on by celebrated chef and caterer, Colin Chung, which he generously donated to the Guild.

The day was interspersed with raffles, sales of tools and a large selection of wood suitable for turning.

At the end of the day it was widely agreed that it had been a great success and should be come an annual event.

 

Denis Whittle       27/06/20

July –  Chairman’s Chat.

I would like to thank everyone who contacted me or have visited since my recent “stroke”. It has been very much appreciated!!
Fortunately, it was minor, four days in hospital and already I am making good progress.

The recent Demo Day was a great success. Our thanks to Roger and Fred for the great demo’s, we all learned a lot.! Also, to Colin Chung for the wonderful lunch.!

The newsletter from Rodney keeps you up to date on what is happening in the club. Over the next few months, we have quite a few things happening and they will all be worth attending. Consequently, we have not have had the opportunity to have the “Saturday chat & turn”. We certainly intend to have these again, but it might not be till next year.

Thanks to those who have helped recently with the club  management as I and some of the committee have been out of action. Any help will be appreciated as it helps the committee to deliver other things for club.

Recently Diego and others have started to interview and video some of our senior members. This will be a great addition to our website & will be a feature of the 30th anniversary celebrations.

Thanks & Regards
Grant.

Introduction to Health and Safety

The Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 has implications for community organisations. Not-for-profit organisations need to consider whether and, if so, what parts of their activities may be covered by the Act, and just as a “she’ll be right” approach to health and safety is not appropriate in for-profit commerce, neither is it appropriate in a community organisation’s activities. While the new statute does not always apply to community organisations a Club or Guild should always endeavour to meet best health and safety practices.

Common woodworking health and safety risks (to operators and those nearby) include accidents associated with machinery, tools, and wood becoming detached from the machine; dust; fumes from and contact with colouring agents and finishing materials, and messy working conditions.

Gathering wood for woodworking (tree felling, lopping branches, converting logs into blanks, and trimming blanks) also involves risks to those carrying out the work and others nearby.

Thinking about how you operate on an individual level is important, the operation of chainsaws, band saw, and all other types of mechanical sawing, as well as hand tools, and lathes, can be a risk. Our biggest challenge is complacancy we get too familiar with an activity, causing inattention, leaving ourselves open to risk.

 Ross Kennedy