What have I done: Mallet
Hey there Steemians, it's Rabbe here. It's been a hectic couple of weeks.
The good news is, I have had a chance to dive back into woodworking, which has felt awesome. I've been making something small for a friend overseas, something that I will probably show you guys as well in a couple days. Today I had some free time since my surface finishing was drying so I decided to make something quick to pass the time.
A what???
Some of you probably know, but for the rest: A mallet is a tool used in woodworking with different kinds of chisels and gouges to make the chisel/gouge cut deeper or more easily into the wood. For short, a mallet is kind of a wooden hammer.
Dumpster diving
The university I study at has quite a sweet workshop that we're allowed to use for our own projects in addition to the stuff we do as a part of our studies. When we test wood, we usually need to cut small pieces from all around the planks which obviously results in a ton of "wood waste". In this case the waste is not useless, since you can easily find 1ft pieces of perfect wood that is practically free since it's been thrown in the trash. It's perfect for small projects like this.
I found these pieces from the trash and thought there might be a mallet hiding somewhere inside them.
Making the blank
So, after I had salvaged the poor pieces of birch from the trash, I glued together a blank. I forgot to take a picture of it, but it looked pretty much like the first pic but with less gaps between the pieces. After the glue had dried for half an hour I removed the clamps, gave the blank a rough shape with a bandsaw to save time and then attached it to the lathe.
Taking it for a spin
So, next up was finding the mallet that was hiding inside my blank. This is basically what my blank looked like after a few rough cuts on the lathe: 
Not looking like much at this point.
Like with most turned pieces, first you have to make the rough cuts to turn it into a cylinder and give it a rough shape. Fast forward->: 
Starting to resemble something...
After the rough cuts it's time to get more serious. Next step was cutting a more accurate shape for the mallet and trying to achieve a surface that's as smooth as possible.
This is the hard part that shows who is a professional and who's not. The ideal situation is that your tools are sharp enough and you have the skill to finish the surface by using only cutting and no sanding. Unfortunately I haven't yet achieved such skill level, so after the cutting I always need to do some sanding. I do enjoy woodturning a whole lot though and have a desire to be better at it, since it's something that's starting to become a "forgotten skill" that very few people are really good at.
So, I ended up with a shape I was happy with and the surface didn't look totally horrible either. Next I made a few details on the handle and some grooves to provide a better grip. To get a smooth surface I then sanded it thoroughly with a few different sandpapers and polished it with some wood dust. Using wood dust for polishing is an old trick I learned from a very experienced joinery master. It's not a secret though, pretty much every woodturner knows it.
Anyways, this is what I came up with. 
There it is, the mallet that was hidden inside the wood.
Final touches
To finish it off I gave the mallet a couple coats of liquid wood wax and polished the surface with a rag made from an old t-shirt.
Aaaaand here we have the finished product.
Kudos to you if you read this far. I know I sometimes go a bit too much into the details with my posts, but in a way that's part of why I make these posts. I want to show you guys what the process is, so that you could understand what it takes to make wooden products. Or even better, to get some of you excited about joinery. Whatever the end result is, I really hope you guys enjoy reading these posts.
If you have made something you'd like to share, please do so. I'd love to see what my fellow Steemians are up to, so leave a comment, a link or whatever you find suitable. Also, if you have an idea on something you'd like to see being made or have a question, please leave a comment.
That's all for today, until next time. Peace.
-R