Demonstration

Review: Jason Breach Demo – Sunday 20th September 2026

Pagoda Box
  • 3-4” spindle blank, dry with no knots etc.
  • Use a ring tail centre to avoid splitting the fibres.
  • Prepare the timber by creating a tenon at both ends. Saw off the lid using a band saw.
  • Start with the lid. Create a bit of a curve. Mark the centre with a skew and drill a hole with a small gouge. Hollow out. Final cuts from edge towards the centre with bevel rubbing. Jason honed a round nosed negative rake scraper with a diamond card and leather. Jason’s scraper has a factory hollow grind. Spend time sanding at the lowest grade before moving up the grits.
  • Cut an inner shoulder using a JB tool or skew. Check the straightness using expanding callipers. Apply sealer and wax.
  • Hold the base in the chuck. Partly round. Remember that the base is going to be square. Create an ogee shape turning outward from the headstock towards the centre.
  • Mark the centre with a skew. Measure the hole diameter on the lid and mark on to the base. Turn a tenon to fit tightly.
  • Shape the outside of the box. Create a bead feature using a bead former. Refine the outer shape. Clean the face.
  • Put the lid on and support with the tailstock. Turn the lid shape to mirror the shape of the base.
  • Create a cylinder as a start of the finial. Remove the tailstock. Create the dome shape of the lid blending into the cylinder. The cylinder depth needs to be a bit longer than at the start. Take care of the thickness as the lid is hollowed.
  • Refine the shape with oval skew.
  • Taper the cylinder. Use the bead former to create a sequence of beads along the finial. The centre hole is rounded into a doughnut using the bead former.
  • Remove the lid and hollow the base.
  • Complete the inside using the box scraper.
  • Sand the lid and base. Seal and wax. Refine the lid fit with sandpaper if necessary.
  • Create a jam chuck to reverse turn the base.
  • Level off the feet. Turn a curved from the outer edge towards the centre. Keep checking how much material is being removed. You need to leave four feet!
  • Create a dome in the centre and decorate.
  • Sand and wax. Clean up the flat edges using a sanding board.
  • Jason finished by buffing.

Saturn Bowl

  • Blank has a central screw hole and one hole offset by 10-15mm in the direction of the grain.
  • Blank is held by a worm screw in the central hole. Turn round and create the Saturn band. Sand the band. Put the blank on the offset hole. Paint with blackboard paint.
  • Create a tenon and shape the base section of the bowl.
  • Reverse the piece in the chuck leaving the screw chuck in place. Create the top part of the bowl roughly. The overall shape of the bowl is part of a sphere. Reverse back. Refine the bowl shape.
  • Sand the bottom part.
  • Reverse again. Flatten the other side of the ring. Reduce the thickness. Refine the shape of the top bowl trying to blend the two sides to form a sphere. Sand the ring and bowl.
  • Hollow out the inside. Keep plenty of material in the centre until you have established the wall thickness and depth down to the ring. Sand.
  • Reverse in a jam chuck held with tape.
  • Remove as much of the tenon as possible with tailstock support. Remove the tailstock and remove the rest of the tenon. Sand.
  • Reverse in the jam church. A small block is inserted in the edge to create an offset.

Mood Owl

  • Eyes: Make a batch of them. Turn a 10mm dowel and drill a 4mm hole. Drill out a bigger hole and insert a blackwood dowel. Make grooves at 1cm intervals, saw off each one.
  • Head: Round a small spindle blank. Measure the diameter. Mark the diameter across the blank, and mark the centre. Turn a sphere. Hold between sphere jig to remove the nubs. Turn at two different angles to refine the sphere. Sand. The headstock jig has two pencil marks at 90 degrees to locate the eye positions. Hold the ball in a doughnut chuck with an eye in the centre. Hollow out the eye hollow. Use a forstner bit to drill out and eye rim and then a smaller drill for the eye. Insert the eye and turn round. Sand. Do the same with the other eye.Carve in two grooves for the beak, or use pyrography.
  • Body: Round a spindle blank. Hold in a chuck. Turn the top of the body and hollow out the “neck” and check that the head will sit in the hollow. Sand.