A tad bit of woodworking.

[Ben H]

I made this little cake stand for the wife last year while she was taking decorating lessons at Micheal's. I thought you guys would appreciate woodworking as a hobby. I mostly do flat work and furniture, but every now and then I fire up the lathe. Just thought I'd share.

It's made from hard maple (from MI) and purple heart (not from MI)[]

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[Les]

aha! Now I know what happened to my maple tree!

Nice piece. Is the base solid?

[gtblum]

Nice! What's it finished with?

[Ben H]

aha! Now I know what happened to my maple tree!

Nice piece. Is the base solid?

Kinda, sorta, not really. The base was a PITA, I had a bunch of 3" strips laying around. Now since I'm too tight to drop 100 bucks on a cake stand blank that will get used once a blue moon, I took a stab at a segmented glue up. I cut a bunch of little blocks at 22.5, different lengths for each layer of the base. Glued up each layer separately and then all of them together. The top two layers are solid, the rest have a small gap like a hollow stop sign.

It was quite a challenge keeping the tear out down while turning. The points where two of the small pieces met flew off like shrapnel while trying to get the basic shape. Overall, she loved it, so I'm happy.

[Ben H]

Thinned BLO (boiled linseed oil) and General Finish Arm-R-Seal (good stuff)