2nd Walnut Bow

 I've started on one of the better Walnut staves, got it roughed out, steamed out some deflex, sideways bend an twist, which I did all in one go. I've tried it on the tiller just to see how it was moving. It's showing the right limb as weakest just out of the fade, but there is plenty of weight to play with.
 I've rather stalled now as other things have piqued my interest. Not really sure what I want it to turn into...
Meanwhile, I've been trying to turn a new leadscrew nut for my little lathe as the existing one is sloppy and has a load of backlash. I'm turning one out of nylon 

which will hopefully be tough enough for the loads imposed on it. Nylon is also self lubricating and being slightly flexible it allows a tighter fit.

Anyway, it kept me out of mischief and I practised on a chunk of Laburnum first. It's quite a fiddly process turning an internal ACME thread, but it taught me a good deal... (one thing being that metric and imperial aren't interchangeable!)

It took a bit of fiddling and fettling to get the nut to fit correctly, but it seems to work very well, the bcklash is gone and it actually seems to give a smoother cut, even taking off 20thou which is more than I'd normally take on this small lathe 10-15 is my usual max. Of course it could just be my fond imagining.