Salt & Pepper Mills Build Process
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Posted 2nd April 2025
A slightly delayed post as I hadn't got round to taking the last photo, but I've now finished all but one of the mills (and I'm not sure I can be bothered with yet another attempt in order to complete the set, so I think I'll leave it here for now).
After having a couple of coats of hard wax oil, the mills were ready for assembly with their mechanisms:
I used one of my home-made bar clamps to squeeze the mechanism into place. I used a lid (without it's mechanism fitted yet) to give the shaft somewhere to go and a bit of leather to make sure I didn't mark the lid. As before, a 3D-printed ring was used to press on the bottom of the mechanism:
That all went fairly smoothly, apart from on one of the oak mills, where the body cracked:
I'd already cleared the lathe away and couldn't face the idea of another go, so I'm going to leave it at 5 mills. My primary aim was to make a second set to be used as a birthday present for a friend. I'd wondered about a third set as a birthday present for someone else, but we've got other things as gifts anyway and this was only going to be a possible extra. I'll keep the extra walnut peppermill as a spare and if I ever get another bout of woodturning enthusiasm, I might make another oak one to go with it.
For now though, I'm calling this project done, with two salt mills and three peppermills:
Page 11 of 11
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