Gears

[Michelle Rich]

I've always been fascinated by gears, so I, of course needed to make a wood rendition. Maple with a tad of spalting. about 9 in diam.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Beautiful piece Michelle. Kinda reminds me of when I work on a watch looking into it before disassembly.

[Scott Lux]

I do love your negative space work. This one may be my favorite. Just gorgeous.

[Doug W Swanson]

Wow! That is exceptional!

[Steve Schlumpf]

Wow - looks like everything inside is moving! Great effect!!

[Bob Bergstrom]

kinda gets you all geared up!! Great use of the negative space. Gets your head spinning too.

[Tim Rinehart]

Nicely done. Sure does have a hypnotic effect. Do you ever get that feeling when making these? Wouldn't surprise me.
I don't recall if you've made pieces where the front and back can move independently, but would be cool to imagine the effect.

[charlie knighton]

fine , mighty fine

[Tom Winship]

Michelle, an intriguing piece. Warning though, if this is rotating, I can see where you might wake up on top of your lathe. Be careful please.

[Michelle Rich]

thanks for your concern Tom..Amazingly, I have never had one break apart..I am extremely careful..I do not have on a radio..or ear plugs, etc...i need to hear that little cracking noise that would tell me to RUN!!! (the scary part is the piece on the outside centers flying around..makes a noise like a plane propeller!! )

[Baxter Smith]

Very cool work Michele! As I was studying the pattern for symmetry, the top and bottom doesn't appear to have quite the same hole pattern. Is that the angle of the picture, intentional, accidental or something else?:)

[Eric Holmquist]

Great concept and well thought out arrangement of the cuts and holes to get the intersections of the two sides to line up so well!

[Eric Gourieux]

I don't know how you do it, Michelle, but I love your signature pieces!

[Kathy Marshall]

Beautiful piece (again!) Michelle!

[Michelle Rich]

Hi Baxter..It's a piece of art..I do not have CNC so I have to go with 70+ yr old eyes..I'm not exactly sure what you are asking, but perfection & symetry were only half of the equation..enough that it was interesting, but not stiff and have massive precision. Geometrics, whether in stained glass or woodworking is a tough road to hoe, as the eye always sees minor disrepancies...Despite what you see as errors, I hope you like it , none the less.

[Baxter Smith]

Thanks Michele. Letme say first I like it a lot and think it is neat! Depending on the mood I am in and how interestingI find something, I sometimes study it and wonder about the how’s and whys. Since most of your work takes quite a bit ofplanning and precision, I started to wonder about the planned vs unplanned. (the placement of the drilled holes?)
The top left and bottom right large outer holes are flanked by smaller holes. The top right and bottom left only have an inner hole. (Now that I am thinking about it, I assume you didn’t want holes extending into the rim. But last night I was thinking you wanted them to be different) On the left side there are 5 consecutive pairs of holes going toward the center. On the right side, the outer ring has a pair of holes and then there are single holes for the next three rings going in. Studying it and thinking about it more this morning, it appears that all your holes only go through a single layer if you will. There was room for those double holes on the left, there wasn’t on the right.
I don’t regard any of this as “errors”. I prefer the variations to the cold and rigid look of a cnc production. Last night I was wondering if the slight discrepancies were intentional by the artist right from the beginning, or just the result of the way things worked out. :)

[Randall Houghton]

Love it. Great stuff would love to see one displayed as a large pinwheel. Minor variations are good as it indicates that it was made by a human and not a computer. Looking for ward to more.
Regards
Randy