Woodturning: Making a Pepper Mill

Series Summary

Woodworkings origin dates back to around 1300BC when the Egyptians first created a two-person lathe. One person would turn the wood with a rope while the other used a sharpened tool to cut shapes in the wood. The Romans used a turning bow to improve the Egyptian design. Germany, Britain and France followed with early bow lathes. A pedal was used to replace the hand-operated turning method, allowing the craftsman's hands to hold the woodturning tools freely. In this free crafts video series, learn how to make a pepper mill from a woodturning expert. Lou Zabohonski has the experience to show you how to create a fantastic pepper mill. Lou first shows you how to prepare a blank. After that move on to boring out the body, separating the top and shaping the body. Finally you'll learn how to size, mark, form, sand and finish the top and body. Learn an original and creative gift idea from an experienced woodturner.

Video Transcript

"Hi during this series we are going to be looking at making creating an 8 inch pepper mill from a block of 2 and 1/2 inch by 2 and 1/2 inch mahogany approximately 9 inches long. We'll be looking at once the wood is brought to round we will be using a story stick to mark out location of coves, beads, and other features along the body of the pepper mill. This is a project that is probably an intermediate level. It is easy enough for beginners to do but it will take a little bit of experience to get it done. We will be using more advanced skills such as a skew to square the bottom of the pepper mill and will be using or showing you how to bore through. We will also show you the assembly using pepper mill mechanisms which you can purchase through a number of different sources through the Internet."