Wood Turning Project By A Beginner – Jewellery Display.
I have recently ordered a selection of Swarovski Elements together with the silver fixing bails and silver chains to sell at antique fairs where we display our antique silver.
Whilst these items are not antique they are small cheap impulse buys for those who browse these fairs but who do not have the money to purchase expensive items. They make ideal little gifts.
Having ordered them I turned my attention to the problem of how to display them. Space on the table is limited and therefore I decided to have them hanging on their chains.
I took a look around my workshop and found two nice pieces of Indian Rosewood which I decided would make a nice turntable top and base. I then located a nice length of Bubinga wood left over from an earlier project, I set about turning the Bubinga into a simple shaped spindle.
The purpose of the item was to display and not to be a feature in itself so I choose to do nothing fancy. The Indian Rosewood I turned and the cut out a whole in the base to insert the central stem and I used a discarded Brass end piece from an old axminster tools secret compartment kit to form the finial of the display.
A simple screw was added to the top of the shaft which seated into the brass finial to allow a simple low friction revolving top. I then purchased a pack of brass hooks from my local Lawsons (half the price of the same product at B&Q) which I inserted at even points around the circumference.
The finished item was the assembled and the pendants hung from each hook.
As a display piece it works well but it is no masterpiece.
I really like the look of it but my wife Karen thinks it too thick and chunky! Ah well it serves a purpose and was again more practice on the lathe.
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I love what you have done to make a display for necklaces. I think your wife must have seen it from a neighbours house!
I like the way you indexed the position of the brass hanging hooks. How did you get the positions correct?
Keep up the good work and lets see more of your woodwork.
Mike McFreeman
I should have said Karen thought it so ugly it could double as a mug tree!! Well the proof of the pudding is in the eating and at its first outing at our last fair we sold three chains from it so I feel vindicated!
In regard to the position of the hooks, I would like to say I used the indexing calibration from the lathe but in reality I forgot the facility was there so I cut a long piece of thin strip paper to the exact circumference of the top and marked out the exact even position by dividing the length by the number of screws. I then taped it around the top and drilled pilot holes at each position. Not very scientific but it worked!!
Thank you for you kind comments.
Regards
Steve
PS its good to see readers from north of the border!!