I hope you will forgive this temporary OT digression from the wit &
words about the best lathe, the best tool, the best technique offered by
the best informed with the best angst.

I enjoy the discourse on rcw. It needs no monitor nor pictures and I
wonder if pics of pots and the posts of praise that usually follow may
sometimes hinder good repartee and innovative thinking. Is a picture of
a turning always worth a thousand words about turning?

Visuals have a necessary place, but do any of you agree that written
words might sometimes better inform and entertain than pics and videos?

Enough of this OT digression, back to our ng. What do you think is the
best ten dollar lathe for a 84 year old COC and average turner who got
his first Sears Dunlap in 1937 when a shallow bowl was considered to be
a deep hollow form? Oh, never mind.


Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter



http://community.webtv.net/almcc/MacsMusings

(Arch) wrote:

I hope you will forgive this temporary OT digression from the wit &
words about the best lathe, the best tool, the best technique offered
by the best informed with the best angst.

I enjoy the discourse on rcw. It needs no monitor nor pictures and I
wonder if pics of pots and the posts of praise that usually follow may
sometimes hinder good repartee and innovative thinking. Is a picture
of a turning always worth a thousand words about turning?

Visuals have a necessary place, but do any of you agree that written
words might sometimes better inform and entertain than pics and
videos?

"...[i]f a new technology extends one or more of our senses outside us
into the social world, then new ratios among all of our senses will
occur in that particular culture. It is comparable to what happens when
a new note is added to a melody. And when the sense ratios alter in any
culture then what had appeared lucid before may suddenly become opaque,
and what had been vague or opaque will become translucent. (Gutenberg
Galaxy 1962, p. 41)" Marshall McLuhan


Enough of this OT digression, back to our ng. What do you think is
the best ten dollar lathe for a 84 year old COC and average turner who
got his first Sears Dunlap in 1937 when a shallow bowl was considered
to be a deep hollow form? Oh, never mind.


Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter



http://community.webtv.net/almcc/MacsMusings

Arch,

You know, they say that a picture is worth a thousand words. I don't
disagree. However, I have noticed that too many texts rely too much on
pictures to tell the whole story.

I have found that if I can articulate my thoughts with the written
word, then what pictures, diagrams or other illustrations I choose to
provide supplement the word, rather then the other way around.

Discourse on rcw, of course, is the ultimate. I find that our
collective discussions here challenge me to use clear, concise
language. I strive for succinct text instead of verbose
communications.

Joe Fleming - San Diego

Well Arch, I got my Sears Dunlap lathe in 1936. Tools available were
for spindle turning so I made hollowing tools out of car leaf springs
and very heavy duty files. Worked pretty well too.

Wally

"Wally" wrote in message
ups.com...
Well Arch, I got my Sears Dunlap lathe in 1936. Tools available were
for spindle turning so I made hollowing tools out of car leaf springs
and very heavy duty files. Worked pretty well too.


Of course there was lead in the gas, no seatbelts in the cars and no helmets
for tricycle riders then. I suppose that's what made scrapers from files
seem safe then and dangerous now.

Very true, George. We didn't expect to live forever, weren't afraid of
our food, took personal responsibility for what we did and didn't know
we were not well off because all our friends were in the same boat. It
was that walking five miles barefoot thru the snow to the unheated one
room schoolhouse that we all hated.

I still have that Dunlap, but I don't turn on it and I wear shoes...at
least on cold days. Nowadays, I fear egg yolks, file-scrapers, gas
shortages and lawsuits, but I'm willing to assume the risk because I
don't expect to live forever.


Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter



http://community.webtv.net/almcc/MacsMusings

Arch wrote:

but do any of you agree that written
words might sometimes better inform and entertain than pics and
videos?

Oh yes. Without doubt. While I might snicker at a picture, or say
"so... that's what that looks like" or something along those lines, it
is certainly not the same as we written verbage.

I can read and completely enjoy Ambrose Bierce at just about any given
time, and enjoy it each time I read anything he wrote.

The same with Samuel Clemens (aka mark Twain) of which I have read
steadily since I was a nipper. As I grew older, my appreciation of his
work grew as I understood there was something more to them than just a
good yarn.

Pictures give a snapshot of a scene, and can sometimes help put things
into a perspective that the mind alone cannot by reading descriptive
text. You can read that a thousand houses were under water from
Katrina, but to see a picture of only rooftops and floating cars for
miles brings perspective.

A picture of a flooded house with watermarks showing how high the water
actually was will impress and may cause personal reflection on how hard
it must be for those that called that house home.

But well written text that tells the story of the people that lived
there and how it impacted them personally, and how it affects their
lives in the long term really tells the story.

I think both pictures and text have their place, each lends itself to a
different purpose. I get significantly more pleasure from reading a
well written, sometimes clever piece of work than I do simply looking
picture.

Robert

Reminds me of a sig file I saw somewhere.

"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving
safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside,
thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming, 'WOW! What A
Ride!'"


"Arch" wrote in message
...
Very true, George. We didn't expect to live forever, weren't afraid of
our food, took personal responsibility for what we did and didn't know
we were not well off because all our friends were in the same boat. It
was that walking five miles barefoot thru the snow to the unheated one
room schoolhouse that we all hated.

I still have that Dunlap, but I don't turn on it and I wear shoes...at
least on cold days. Nowadays, I fear egg yolks, file-scrapers, gas
shortages and lawsuits, but I'm willing to assume the risk because I
don't expect to live forever.


Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter



http://community.webtv.net/almcc/MacsMusings

(Arch) wrote:

I still have that Dunlap, but I don't turn on it and I wear shoes...at
least on cold days. Nowadays, I fear egg yolks, file-scrapers, gas
shortages and lawsuits, but I'm willing to assume the risk because I
don't expect to live forever.


I wear shorts and a short sleeve shirt (out of respect for the neighbors)
until it gets below freezing - then I'll wear jeans. I've been known to eat
a burger with fried egg and bacon on top and I ate at the Bolo Burger in
Pasadena a few times and lived to tell about it. Frankly, I didn't expect
to live this long, let alone forever. At the rate I'm accumulating
replacement parts (ears, eyes, and two hips), I expect that when the engine
dies they'll part me out on e-bay. )

"Lobby Dosser" wrote in message
news:ubV2f.30405$A52.10339@trnddc02...
(Arch) wrote:

I still have that Dunlap, but I don't turn on it and I wear shoes...at
least on cold days. Nowadays, I fear egg yolks, file-scrapers, gas
shortages and lawsuits, but I'm willing to assume the risk because I
don't expect to live forever.


I wear shorts and a short sleeve shirt (out of respect for the neighbors)
until it gets below freezing - then I'll wear jeans. I've been known to
eat
a burger with fried egg and bacon on top and I ate at the Bolo Burger in
Pasadena a few times and lived to tell about it. Frankly, I didn't expect
to live this long, let alone forever. At the rate I'm accumulating
replacement parts (ears, eyes, and two hips), I expect that when the
engine
dies they'll part me out on e-bay. )

====LOL. What sort of cholesterol levels do you have?

Leif