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...Way back in the mists of time... (1991)

I was doing Craft shows, exhibiting turned work, and making the odd bit of furniture.  My lathe was rudimentary, made from bits of old washing machine and scrap bed irons... (literally) the rest of my equipment was mainly hand tools, and it was before the time of cheap computers, Chinese lathes, or easy access to decent kit; -And I didn't have any money, - as anyone doing small craft fairs knows only too well.  All I wanted was to make my work stand out, so I though about making something that would cut flutes.  At that time I knew nothing about Ornamental Turning, hadn't even seen Holtszapffel's book...

    Then, one Saturday night, I got an idea how to do it, using my usual array of bits of old scrap... Well, that blew Sunday, but by the end of that day, using bits of old lawnmower, I had a rig that proved that it could be done; but it raised more questions than it answered. 

nearly the first item ever made...

I did a little research then, to find that no-one had done anything like it before.  This surprised me to say the least... what I had done seemed so simple... I knew so little (then) that it didn't seem strange to me to be making cuts on work spinning at 500RPM!

Wanting to make a living, I thought about Patents, and discovered that I needed to be careful from then on, so I was... and spent way too much time over the next six months developing the mechanical machine into a form that I could present to a manufacturer, with a view to having them make it and sell it, and to open up the craft to this new form of working.  About this time I was able to produce items like this...

2.75in diameter basket weave box in Luan... I still didn't know much about Ornamental turning...

Well, that was it... I filed for a patent; Then, two manufacturers later, I found myself talking to some quite excited people from Robert Sorby, in my shed, and they were trying the machine out.  The one they tried would index cuts at 11, 22, 33, 44, and 66 positions, and the cutter could be tracked sideways to cut the flutes that I had wanted to make in the first place.

44 flutes on 3in diameter Lilac block... cut in about five minutes..

A couple of meetings later, I had an answer:  They liked the machine, but not in its current form, and couldn't envisage a way to combat the prototype's two major problems: - (1) It was very loud; and (2) it didn't 'just sit' on anyone's average lathe without modification... Did I think it would be possible to make an Electronic one?

So began chapter two... Which took until '93. 
Many more people had been involved in the project by this time, but as development (didn't)  went on, each time the Sorby team got stuck, luckily I was able to figure out the answer... finally, with the assistance of my brother in law, who designed the electronics, and the team at Sorby, we had a machine that worked. 

Boxwood weed vase 4in high.

...Then there was testing, making sure that it passed all the necessary regulations... getting a manufacturer to make the electronic control boxes... sourcing other components, and eventually getting it into a make-able form...
A machine that could index cuts at 6, 8, 12, 16, 18, and 24 positions onto a spinning piece of work, and 'rotate' those positions by 2.5 degree increments, which would just sit on an average lathe. 
...It couldn't cut flutes, - neither was it possible for it to index at more than 24 positions... believe me, we tried.  Getting 24 was hard enough. 

By this time though, as you can see, I had a much better understanding of Ornamental Turning!

The Launch for the final machine was the Wembley tool show in march(?) '96, where I stood and demonstrated a machine priced at £440.00, in front of a bemused British public, who generally didn't know what to make of it... and also I was invited to demonstrate it to the Society of Ornamental Turners... some of whom were 'interested', - although in the main, at the time, they didn't think it was 'for them'.  -I went home and really began to discover what I could do with it... discovering that its capabilities were unique...

different surface designs created with the RS3000...

Well, the patent 'proved', so now I knew for certain that no-one else had ever thought of a machine like mine, and I had two pretty certificates: - One for UK, and one for North America.
In November '96 I went to California to teach a gentleman to use his RS3000, and to demonstrate the machine to the American public... who reacted much the same way as the Brits had.

Time passed, and '97 was upon us.  Sales had started slow, but were picking up gradually... Then an un-foreseen un-asked for disaster happened: - The Marketing Executive at Robert Sorby, - the guy who had had enough foresight to back the idea in the first place- died suddenly. 

I think it fair to say that at that point in time, Robert Sorby went into a flat spiral.  Inevitably, there was a major re-structuring, and one of the products that got axed in the interests of 'consolidation' was the RS3000.

So, there I was... The Ornamental Turning Device dead in the water.  I was in no position to take over the marketing and demonstrating of the machine, even if Sorby's were prepared to continue to manufacture it for me as the sole customer... so, after much soul searching, I let it drop.

Since then, every few months, without any publicity, I have received enquiries about it: - do I have one left? do I know of any second-hand ones? Is anyone making it still?

Well, it is now ten years since production ceased, and as I am still receiving enquiries, I have decided that it is time to try for a come-back, with a whole new machine... Fully mechanical,  for five main reasons: -

1. To increase the range and capacity, and to
2. avoid the problems associated with the electronic one, and
3. I can incorporate all that I have learned into a mechanical machine now,
4. Mechanical ones are easier for users to understand, and
5. Because I can make the mechanical ones myself, in my workshop, without referring to any committees!!

Anyone interested in this development should contact me... MTOram@woodshedproducts.co.uk

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Last modified: 30/10/2008