Making a Wind Spinner

Another rainy weekend had us in the workshop working on a project. We decided to build a wind spinner for the yard. God knows, it’s usually windy enough here for it to spin. I had the hardware written on our shopping list but turns out Jim had just what we needed already in the workshop. Of course he did.

We gathered everything together on the workbench. Wood. Check. Fishing lure spinner. Check. Threaded rod. Check.  And some assorted washers and end caps.

I didn’t ask where he saved a fishing lure spinner from. In 30 years I have never seen him go fishing.

First we had to decide how big we wanted it to be and settled on about 18 inches long. So to start, we had to cut the wood into strips and decided that 1/4 inch thick looked good. We were winging it. Jim cut out all the strips, 64 in total, on the table saw. It didn’t take as long as you might think.

I kept an eye on the cutting progress.

It took 64 slices of wood to reach the 18 inch mark.

The wood strips needed a hole cut in each for the rod to thread through, so I did the measuring…

…while Jim drilled the holes.

We decided to put it together to make sure it would spin before we went any further. You know, just in case.

We weren’t finished yet. We had to cut out the shape using the bandsaw. You could use a scroll saw, jigsaw, or miter saw but we used the bandsaw. This is the shape we decided to try.

So with the rod threaded through the slices to keep everything aligned, Jim took it to the bandsaw to trim the excess.

Then it was back in the house for the pieces to be stained. Took about an hour using rubber gloves and a rag to wipe the stain on. We contemplated  painting it different colors, and maybe if we make another we will try that. Also thought about just painting the ends a bright color. Here they are drying.

Once dry, I was left with a jumble of wood pieces.

Took a little bit of time to sort them out and get them back in the proper order. Once I had them lined up it was time to thread the rod through the holes again.

And with that we have a new wind spinner that we made ourselves. Here it is hanging from one of our birch trees.

So…those are the steps we took to build a wind spinner, but you do you.

Later