Winter Nurse

Transverse Doggeral Insomnia and Prepping the Gorton Mill

(I’ve been up since yesterday morning - so excuse any typos!)

Today was a spectacular fall day. I started this day early at midnight measuring the openings to my workshop and found the outer door a puny 27”. There was no way to move the Pantograph mill in without removing some parts so that was planned for later in the afternoon. I eventually went to bed at 2AM only to find an immovable Goldendoodle spread across the bed. These was no way to sleep with my legs hanging over empty space so I got up at 3AM. This is sort of normal for the more hypomanic part of my Cyclothymia so I got up and basically went back to work, and posted a blog. These manic periods make me more verbose and its good to channel some of that into writing and creativity, while also getting my work done.

I will be done tomorrow with the tuning and voicing of the 5 flutes remaining in the queue and sending 3 of these out by the end of the week. I’ll be attending a scientific conference Saturday through Wednesday - some of this from the comfort of my bench as I work on keys for the remaining two flutes. The Geological Society of America annual convention is nearby in Portland. Fortunately the one actionable session that I must attend Tuesday afternoon is also online, as is the Saturday Short Course on Echinoderms that the Paleontological Society is hosting. Am seeing that many of the field trips requiring overnight stays are mostly cancelled probably due to the Covid risk. Attendees to the conference in Portland are required to be vaccinated, as well as tested 3 days previously with a negative result. Even with that due diligence, there still is some risk.

So in the middle of the night I decided to create yet another Substack - this one called Woodwind Making. This one will have paid subscriptions ($10 most likely) and will be an instructional weekly post on techniques etc. that I have accumulated in the last 40 years of my career. Its a data archive of my accumulated knowledge. The first and then every 5th post will be free. The first will be the introduction. Every 5th will be a synopsis of the previous and future paid content. My wife Nancy will help with the editing as well as answering questions or comments - though I want to keep my involvement in that to perhaps 10 responses. I want to create at least a month’s worth of weekly posts and then announce in November. The posts are geared to amateur and beginning woodwind makers, wood turners, my woodwind clients who may simply enjoy this content, and even the occasional colleague. The writing has already begun!

So no sleep at all for me. We have a temperamental oil burner for our radiant floor boiler that has an intermittent electrical problem possibly. It only will run for a few hours (actually in that space of time it only runs about 15-20% of that time). This morning I started it at 3:30 and amazingly its still going 14 hours later. It may have simply solved itself. So I monitored it while having breakfast and reading the news. And Facebook. Which became even less reliable than my old Beckett AFII. They say that it was simply a server problem, unrelated to this weekend’s breathtaking whistleblowing (not to mention the not-distantly related Pandora incident. My guess it was a cyberattack from disgruntled employees within. So errands in the morning, more cleanup around the outside of the workshop. And then Prepping the Milling Machine.

Pictures to follow. This Gorton Pantograph is really sweet and my friend Bob had finally moved it to a place where I could work all around it. I stripped it of some vulnerable components that would possibly go flying off while in transit such as the rare 5/16” collet and collet closer. Most importantly I was able to remove the tool tray with the attached countershaft arm, as well as one of the leadscrews that stuck out one side - making it vulnerable. The mill now will fit through my 27” doorway.

On the way back I stopped at my dear friend Alden’s. He’s providing the transportation and was doing some maintenance on the trailer we’ll use. The plan is to move this mill on Thursday afternoon. I can’t wait to set it up and start using this. If all goes well I may be making my first prototype glass flute bodies in November.

Nancy is all aboard on my new woodwind making blog - she usually can spot early on when such ideas are potential nightmares later on. Keeping a wave of ready to use posts will prevent that. Actually I work less efficiently out in the workshop when I am at my low points, especially in horrible November weather and darkness. But I always enjoy writing so this will be a good salve.

I was describing this new blog to my friend Paul who also double-checks my wild dreams and crazy ideas. I haven’t heard back. I was sending him a text on my iPhone, dictating into it. For some reason Siri kept having issues with the term “Wood Turner” and instead would type “Winter Nurse”. This from now on, all wood turners will each be termed a “Winter Nurse” and I am really tempted to use that as my Blog title.

Here is a link to a site with pictures of one of these mills very similar to mine - almost identical except for the labeling: http://millingaccessories.biz/2014/12/20/pristine-gorton-famco-lars-p1-2-two-dimensional-pantograph-engraver/

Here is the stripped down - ready to transport mill, side view. The table is 8” wide for scale.

Here is the front view (ignore the clutter in the background. For scale the table is 18” long. I have a bunch more pictures but will post better ones once this is moved and put back together in my workshop. Overall maximum with is 24”. The pantograph itself can be moved around if necessary but I don’t think that will happen.

Here is a view of the pantograph arms. The stylus table in the background has been rotated 90 degrees. The rotating linkage in the middle with the overhead cast iron arm is a fixed point - though this can slide fore and aft. The cutting spindle is on the lower right.

This, below, is the main difference with the one in that link above. It turns out that mine is labeled “Rudel” (pronounced “Rudall”). Seems appropriate for one intended for flute making!