Welcome to this channel, my name is Ray Whitby, your host. Thanks for joining me. In this video I take on the January Clock Challenge 2021
a challenge set by Huw of Wooden-it-be-Nice My thanks to Huw for the invitation and I hope this is
a worthy contribution I had to quickly narrow down a couple of ideas Each had their unique challenges within, but decided
I was most likely to complete this project in January! So first off is to cut a lot of acute triangles. I'm using
oak throughout for the clock face and rim I thought I had better use a guide to lay out the pieces
but as you can see I couldn't quite get that right Nonetheless it was useful template to get started with.
The backing piece is 6mm plywood and using PVA glue I think on reflection I should have sealed the plywood with clear
tape then stuck the triangle pieces down There are a quite a few components to this piece and gives
me time to reflect a little I wanted something contemporary looking and combine a
few different woodworking techniques and woodturning too I also wanted something that didn't look anything like the other
contestants pieces either I limited myself to watching only a few of their videos prior to
starting my project (but now I can watch the rest!) It would be good if you could also look at their videos and
support their channels.
The link is below I've not done any parquet flooring and you probably wont let
me loose in your house to do it there either! Laying down a pattern is easier said than done. I should have
made the pattern first before cutting any triangles. My bad. Once the pattern is formed and the pieces dried, then the sides
of the resin mold can be laid I'm using chipboard with a melamine surface. The exposed
chipboard provides a useful gluing surface. You can see I've butted the pieces to form the mold.
This way you don't have to cut each piece to fit. These sides were recycled from a previous resin river wall
art project, but as you will see later, this is their last use Right, now to cut more acute triangular pieces. These need
to be quite thick to have sufficient sacrificial area when turning I have seen a number of really cool table saw jigs for this
type of repetitive cutting, but I still haven't done one for myself Here's the difficult bit I had to solve.
You can deconstruct a
hollow cylinder into triangular pieces, but they are not all the same When you try to bevel cut triangular pieces, they do not stack
into a hollow cylinder seamlessly Only on one face will the triangles meet. Time for a new
woodworking cut! However, if you change the bevel angle from the apex to the corner
of an acute triangle, then they will stack seamlessly I doubted it was a new cut, but no-one seems to have heard
of this before, so I don't know if this cut has a name In fact my colleagues doubted that the problem really existed till I
showed them. They believed it was all down to compound cuts So here is my solution.
A ramp that will raise one side of the
triangle whilst being cut The apex will have a bevel angle of zero and this angle changes
till it reaches about 16 degrees at the corner Ingenious right? No. Oh well.
Anyway, it solved the problem I had. But what to name it? Because each part of the sides is orientated to the middle of
the cylinder, it's named "radially aligned varying bevel angle" cut Moving swiftly on! I coat each triangular piece with resin.
Porous
wood should be sealed with a matching resin for resin pours Then time to lay out the base of the cylinder to form the clock
rim. 16 triangles pointing up and 16 pointing down This time I did have a template that I tried to stick to as closely
as possible. then using a hot glue gun, I stuck down each piece to prevent
them from moving This will help with the stacking of the cylinder and when pouring
resin I used 2mm square oak matchsticks as spacers for the triangles
Decided to affix them at the apex and corners of each piece It's fiddly work, but best to use a viscous CA glue and patience
for placing each match stick The length of each matchstick was 4-6mm, but need to mate only
2mm onto the triangle surface These are sacrificial and will be removed when woodturned
but provide a useful spacing for epoxy resin filling Stacking was not a straightforward as planned.
The matchsticks
should have been positioned a little lower from the corners And some had to be removed Once all were placed then a drop some CA glue onto each joint This provides sufficient bonding strength to survive the resin pour Time to make the custom resin mold Using a thick plastic sheet cut into wide strips to form the barrier
on the inner and outer surface of the cylinder Hot glue is used to stick everything together and provide
a liquid barrier to prevent leaking After a number of projects that leaked I tend to overuse the
hot glue to make sure nothing escapes Using a deep pour epoxy resin. I did measure and crunch some
numbers to work out how much was needed. And I had a little extra to spare, so something went right for
a change Added a little black mica powder, then some green resin dye
Trying to get the quantities right to make it translucent Also added some pearlescent powder too However, I think this caused issues with trapping bubbles in the resin during curing Didn't have many issues with bubbles forming with this deep pour
resin before, so looking for a logical explanation After pouring I did ensure there were no bubbles clinging
to the sides And tried to do this for the first couple of hours.
The whole thing
was too big to go into a pressure pot Rice! I thought I'd better use something to provide some pressure
to the inner wall of the mold, so 2 bags with rice Bit of a mistake. Should have used a single bag as 2 leaves
a couple of gaps where a small leak did develop But a little extra resin provided equal pressure to stop the leak Once cured, the rice can be poured out and reused. For future
resin work rather than eating. Then the resin mold for the clock rim can be deconstructed The outer barrier was easier to remove than the inner one It came away clean and can be reused. The inner barrier however I had to tear out The clock face resin mold had to be tapped apart.
I realised that
I didn't have to make the clock face this big The clock rim is cut on the bandsaw close to the cylindrical
shape Didn't realise that the base came off easily and probably didn't
need to use the bandsaw, but was going to attach a tenon Then onto the lathe. The remounting jaws seemed the right way
forward But had to keep the speed low to prevent the piece from
dismounting I used carbide tipped tools almost exclusively throughout These are great for woodturning resin, prevents a lot of chip outs First task was to remove the paper template backing Second to get the cylinder down to bare wood on both sides
Resin chips sting a lot! Takes time to remove the excess resin and then work slowly down
to remove the matchsticks With the remounting jaws I had to keep flipping the piece to
complete the outside then the inside A little frustrating not being able to complete the outside in one go
But always could learn more patience One of the "rewarding" moments of woodturning resin is getting the streamers A downside of this project was hand laying the bricks, which led to
a few discrepancies in the uniformity of the layout This is why it is necessary to start with thicker pieces to provide
sufficient sacrifical wood as well as being able to remove the matchstick spacers and
still have sufficient thickness of the cylinder remaining The minor leak did lead to a few issues requiring a little
repair work with fast setting epoxy resin I probably should have put spacers on the bottom layer of triangles Sanding proceeded from 120 grit up to 240.
Again having to flip
the piece to complete the outside and the inside I used sanding sealer, though didn't film it for the clock rim Then redid the 240 grit And onto the Yorkshire grit to complete the sanding of this part I've seen a number of youtube videos using Yorkshire grit, who
apply to the piece stationary Then start the lathe at a slow speed before ramping up I didn't have the confidence that the piece would stay in the
remounting jaws at high speed, so had to make do To the face plate, had to drill a small central hole Then drew a circle on the reverse to the outer diameter of the cylinder Carefully cut to the line as best as possible. Again could
have built a jig to do this accurately But could do with some hand-eye coordination practise Then to finish off on the sander to the final diameter that fits within
the rim of the cylinder It doesn't matter too much if there are some slight deviations
as they will be hidden within the rim the support base for the clock face plate was prise apart Thankfully, the resin-wood bond kept the face plate in tact
and the support base eventually came off The plate is sanded, as with the rim, from 120 to 240 grit There were some surface air bubbles on the face plate and
the rim.
Used 2 part contact spray adhesive to fill They are fairly shallow holes, so no need to colour match Using a pin to make sure there's no air bubble underneath the
liquid Then apply the spray and allow to dry Again, sanding sealer is applied to the front face and sides.
the rear face wont be seen and still glossy from the casting The clock mechanism outline is marked onto the rear of the
clock face plate then routed out… …to the depth of the shaft. The central hole is widened To the rear of the clock rim, a recess is marked to the
required depth Then the recess is turned out being careful not to catch the piece The good thing about building out of separate parts is being
able to orientate the end grain to a more favourable direction and reducing the possibility of catching The face plate is tested to ensure it fits within the recess Once happy with the recess diameter then the depth can
be achieved I used a diamond point scraper to square off the recess, the
only non carbide-tipped woodturning tool for this project Learning woodturning will take me many years! Then the final dry fit of the face plate into the recess I had thought of being able to use the lathe more for the face plate
but end up only using it for the final sanding and polishing On the whole the remounting jaws behaved and kept the pieces
where they should be The final assembly of the clock.
Rapid epoxy resin was used to
glue the face plate into the rim Important to get the alignment of the face plate correct
to the pattern of the rim Must use epoxy resin sparingly to avoid dripping down the rim Rapid epoxy resin gives very limited working time Then apply light pressure to keep in place till cured The clock mechanism can be mounted to the face plate And the hands are attached (without the battery in) And last of all is the battery. Which was a bit of a pain to fit! The clock is complete and the second hand is ticking The final part to the project was to add some backlighting.
I'm using LED lighting strips, which weren't the most flexible Always good to have a test run to make sure the wiring is correct
before mounting within the clock Once fitted, the project is complete. Time to mount on a wall
and take some shots Unlit, the wall clock has a good geometric pattern and the hands
are easily seen Once lit, the lights come through the resin gaps effectively Perhaps the downside was not being able to light the top
most part of the cylinder Overall I was happy with the project, though there's always
room for improvement Thanks for watching.
If you liked this video, please click on the like
button and subscribe. Also would be good if you could comment below. Please also
look at the other contributors for this challenge.