Some brass finials I made

[george wilson]

Made from 5/8" diameter brass rod. The magnified picture hides how petite these are. They all had to be very much the same. For a French brass inlaid desk a conservator is restoring.

Many little diameters to work to here. There is a fair amount of hand work,especially in the shapes of the "trumpets",turned freehand. Fussiest thing is getting them all alike.

These are not buffed yet,and have not had the extra piece of brass I was holding onto them with cut off yet. I have to reverse these in the collet and drill and tap a small hole to screw them on with before cutting the extra 1/2" of brass off.

Also,in case any changes are desired by the customer,I can re chuck them for alterations if needed. So,I'll cut them off when he's here.

The base of the one on the left looks a bit large now that I see them magnified. I'll alter it tomorrow. Too tired now. Back is not good. Epidural only partially helped. Cat got hit by a car yesterday,so up with him late,and woke up early from back pain. He's o.k.,dislocated hip,but last night I was afraid he had a broken hip and broken jaw. He obviously skidded on the side of his face on the asphalt and abraded his face,so I know he was hit by a car. Not good to have that happen on a Sunday when the vet is closed. So,good as I can manage for now.

[ray hampton]

George, nice work,

[Kent A Bathurst]

George:

First - hope the kitty is well.

Next - hope you are well.

Last - you realize you deflate me by about 1,500 millibars with each of your posts, right?

[Todd Burch]

They are pretty close! Nice job.

[Chris Griggs]

Sorry to hear about your cat George. I hope you furry friend has a speedy recovery. Glad he's doing okay.

And beautiful work as always - keep sharing it!

[george wilson]

We have 3 cats and 2 dogs. This one was put out near here as a small kitten. He was out in the rain for hours before we finally heard him meow. It was 10:00 at night,and I let him in and set him at the food bowl. He got into the bowl and ate like he was starving. He has been the most affectionate cat we have had. I don't know how he got up the steps as he was so small,and wonder if he was actually placed on the porch by someone.

[Gary Herrmann]

Beautiful as always, George. Some day I'd like to try my hand at metal work.

3 cats and 2 dogs here too. The baby is a Maine Coon. She's 6 months now and is coming into her own. Chasing the big girls. She gets along fine with the boys (labs) but I think the girls are gonna take a piece out of her to teach her her place.

[Ron Bontz]

Nice work George. As always. Do you free hand any of the work or stay strictly with a metal lathe and holders? They look to have some pretty tight tolerances.

[Scott T Smith]

George, your craftsmanship - as always - is simply stunning. Thanks for sharing.

Scott

[Rodney Walker]

First off, sorry about your cat and your back. I hope both are doing better soon.
Enlarged, yes the one on the left's base is slightly fatter though I'm not sure how to quantify the difference. I would never had seen it if you didn't point it out. In person, the difference has to be nearly impossible to see. To turn 4 small, complex and identical objects by hand is really impressive. They're more examples of the beautiful work you do.
Rodney

[george wilson]

Rodney,I can see that on the left hand piece,the little vertical wall just above the flaring surface at the bottom is a bit shorter than the other 3. I will cut down into the flaring part a bit to make this vertical part as tall as the others,then re turn the flared lower portion and it will be o.k.. Just real tired when I got done yesterday,and hurting too. A magnified picture really shows up little flaws for sure. In person,this flaw is quite small,indeed.

This was a fussy,rather complicated little job. I had to pick it apart piece by piece,element by element,diameter by diameter and establish these turned parts one at a time. I did 1 thing at a time,switching each of the 4 bars of brass in turn and making the required portion 1 at a time. The last thing was freehand turning the "trumpets",and getting them the same. If I had tried doing each piece all at once,they would never have been identical at all. It is a matter of developing a plan of how to process each portion,and figuring out where to start. I did have to think about it.

A problem was,the areas were just too small to get a dial caliper into. I ended up using an OLD 4" Starrett plain caliper,setting it against the dial caliper first,then,using it to fit into the grooves I was turning to set the diameters. I was taught to "feel a thousanth" with plain calipers back in the 60's by an old machinist. I used to learn as much as I could from these old guys.

Having a collet chuck to put the turnings in was a great help as everything ran concentric every time I switched pieces to do each element. Plus,I didn't waste much brass holding it in a collet. Collets become REAL important when turning ivory and minimizing waste.

The conservator who gives me these type jobs is a PHD,with great knowledge about restoration work,and considerable skill. He only ever gives me the stuff he can't do himself .As he does freelance work,he wants to keep as much of the money for himself as he can,which is understandable.


Here's the last job I did for him: Make a new lock case 3/4" longer than the original. The new case looks pink because it was just "pickled" after soldering. I haven't installed the interior bracket yet, or the posts inside it,and didn't take pictures of the finished interior,apparently. But,I had to use the old parts,and lengthen everything 3/4" to work in the new case,plus make the brass keeper to go with it. There is a picture of the old and new lock cases also,and the new keeper. The old keeper had been lost long ago. The new case has the internals installed. Don't know why I didn't make more pictures. I left the new made case looking a bit scarred and used looking,as was the old case. The original would have been cast,but I had no facilities ready to do that,and still would have had to make the patterns up anyway. Easier to just fabricate,and there WAS a money limit for the job! I couldn't just add in a piece of brass,as the color wouldn't have matched,and I'd still have had to lengthen the internal parts anyway.

After silver soldering the case together,I hammered the seams shut tight on the corners,and they were invisible. Pretty good fit anyway,as I had to grind a special angled end mill and experiment with it until it made the requisite angle on the corner joints,and yielded the flared sides of the case when closed up.

I have made 2 such locks. One was MUCH larger,for an original government building in Richmond. The governor's house,or the library,I can't recall which.Maybe another building,but the lock was about a foot long! Someone just ruined the original by doing a horrible job of trying to braze the case,and cracking it really badly. I think I know who ruined it,a hack blacksmith I know.


This lock below was in a historic house. Gunston Hall,I think. The "old" lock was not correct,and was an old Williamsburg repro,which was the closest thing they could find at the time,but it didn't fit the space on the old door.

[Karl Andersson]

George,
beautiful and precise work - it's always very interesting to see what projects you get involved with (and the high level of skill you have in so many areas). I realize you are very exacting and that's why you are putting so much effort into these - but how do you think they were made in the original? Not knowing the date of the desk, it isn't clear whether this was pre-industrial or not, but I doubt the level of exactness of your turning (even if one has a slightly thicker element) was available prior to the 1870's or so -regardless of my lack of knowledge of lathe history though, it seems such effort for 4 finials would have been too inefficient for the times. Do you think the originals were cast to shape then turned smooth, or did they make a profiled cutter like a moulding plane blade that could get all the main elements spaced and cut uniformly at once? Or were they hand-turned but less uniform? It just seems that you're applying Master-level talent to a fairly minor part of the furniture, unless it was made for royalty. Or were there just more George Wilsons with hungry mouths to feed back then, so the cost was lower?

Oh, and I hope the cat heals quickly and learns from his incident- we lost a cat that never figured out the road wasn't his.

Karl

[george wilson]

The desk is likely early 19th.C.. I haven't seen it,but it is a very expensive French boule(brass inlaid) and marquetry desk. I expect the originals were cast and cleaned up on a simple lathe. These are just WAY too much trouble to make clear from scratch and get them the same. I think the job took me 6 or 7 hours,but I wasn't in great shape,either. Cleaning up identical castings would have been infinitely easier,plus the maker doing this regularly would have had a set of form cutters to make the various elements.

I did saw out a brass form,but it proved useless. Everything was linear and diametral measurement in the end,and eyeball gauge for the curved parts.

[george wilson]

Well,$467.00 later,the cat only had a dislocated hip,which we hope will stay back in place. He is trussed up for the next several days to hold the joint in place. There are no visible breaks in his jaw,thank heaven. A new hip is $3000.00 these days,and the cat is middle aged. If just left to heal itself,it will grow an "artificial hip joint" around the ball anyway,though,in about 6 weeks,and the animal will still get around just fine. I had this happen to a dog in the 60's,when I didn't have the money for hip surgery. He lived many years,and would run and play normally after I nursed him for weeks. A rough thing to happen,though.

[Trevor Walsh]

Glad the cat is on his way to recovery.