Solo Rotational Motion

[Eleret]

Spring 13, 513 AV morning It often seemed that just as Eleret felt she was getting comfortable with a task, she was moved to another one. She thought it had to do with how chronically shorthanded the yard now was -- though word had it the plague was fading, or perhaps already faded, there were still many empty benches in the workshops. Places once occupied by those now ill, or even deceased. As a result, the overseers tended to move their workers to whatever task currently had the greatest demand for its output -- at least, those workers who had demonstrated the competence and adaptability to handle such. Eleret supposed it reflected well upon her that she was one of them, even if it made for what seemed a good deal of disruption. Today, she had been assigned to one of the lathes. The tool itself was a deceptively simple thing -- a frame with two metal brackets in which to secure the wood being worked; an upright post supporting a pole which projected out towards here, but off to one side and well above her head; a cord pendant from the pole which ran down through the workspace and hooked to a pedal below. She also had a little three-sided stool to sit on, a familiar set of bins for scraps and finished work, and a whole stack of rods. Tree limbs, she thought, already peeled and mostly evened out, just waiting to be turned into pegs. The Konti regarded those blanks, and the apparatus beside them, for a long moment... then nodded to herself, and stepped up to do her work.

[Eleret]

On the little side table of the lathe rested a set of square-ended blades very similar to the gouges she was accustomed to handling. With them was a single exemplar of the shape she was to be making from the blanks -- a peg with a thickish cross section and gently curving sides, a kind that she thought might be used for a handle or grip. It was a simple thing... but if experience had taught Eleret anything, it was that simple did not in the least equate to easy. The Konti took up a pole from the stack, slotting it into the lathe's clamps. As she did so, she wound a single loop of the dangling rope around it. She checked that it was secure, then experimentally set her foot on the pedal and pressed it down a few times. The pedal pulled at the rope, and the rope turned the wood -- not around and around, but halfway, returning directly to its original orientation when she let up. It was plain to see how the gouge would cut while the wood was in motion, shaving straight around the perimeter run beneath it. Simple, yes. But easy? She wasn't so sure. It would depend how the rotation of the wood acted against the blade. She'd just have to try it and see. Eleret selected a tool with a squared-off edge. Resuming the action of thee pedal, she pressed the blade lightly against the side of the wood. It promptly slid down with the lathe's motion; there was such a thing as being too cautious, and evidently she was practicing it. Eleret tried again, applying a bit more pressure this time, and was rewarded with a thin curl of wood peeling away from the rod. She lifted the blade as the rotation finished, before it could cut on the rebound, and let the shaving fall down to the floor. She paused then to pull the example piece over, arranging it at the front of the table, where she could easily refer to its contours and size. It was a little shorter than her blanks, Eleret realized, something she'd definitely have to take into account along the way.