Woodchucks Q&A

Question: I’ve heard about the Woodchucks, and I pass the woodworking shop on Sun City Boulevard, but I don’t know anything about them. Could you explain how the woodshop operates?

Answer: The Woodchucks is a charter club, like the Bocce Club, the Computer Club, the Pencil and Palette Club, the Tall Oaks Tennis Club, and forty other charter clubs. We have 180 members who share a 4500 ft2 well equipped woodshop. Unlike most other clubs, there are safety issues with powerful woodworking machinery, so every member is trained on the safe use of each piece of equipment before they are allowed to use it. The shop is open six four-hour sessions a week for use by members. Any resident of Sun City is eligible to join the Woodchucks.

Whenever our shop, the Millgrove Woodshop, is open, a foreman and a monitor are on duty to watch all activities in the shop to make sure all safety rules are observed and to answer members’ questions on the best way to complete a project. These positions are filled by members volunteering about once a month. Volunteers also do all of the maintenance on the equipment in the shop. Our Maintenance Director was a mechanic for United Airlines before coming to Sun City.

Beside personal projects, the shop is also used by members to build things for other clubs. If you have seen any of the plays put on by the Theater Company, you have seen sets built by the Woodchucks. When the Meadow View Lodge was built, the Woodchucks were asked to design and build a sign to be placed on the wall at the top of the fitness center stairs. When the Pottery Club needed more storage lockers, the Woodchucks built them. When the Tennis Club built three new tennis courts, the Woodchucks were asked to build two cabanas between the courts for players to get out of the sun between sets. Last summer, the Woodchucks built a storage facility adjacent to the ball field for the Baseball Club. When the Railroad Club was given space in the lower level of the Millgrove Woodshop, the Woodchucks built the walls to define and secure their space and the bathrooms that are shared. There are thirty or forty other projects throughout Sun City that were constructed by the Woodchucks.

One activity that many residents know us by is our now famous “Ask the Woodchucks” days that we hold twice a year, usually in April and October. This is our tenth year of running this event in our shop, where residents bring in broken wooden furniture to be repaired. If you have a broken chair or table you would like us to fix, be sure to watch your Lifestyles Magazine and sign up early, as we can only accommodate twenty-four people at each session.

In addition to all of these activities, classes are offered on a number of woodworking procedures and projects. We just finished a class where students learned to make small decorative wooden boxes. There are classes for raised panel doors, dovetail joints, picture frames, cutting boards, pen and bowl turning, and much more. We also have a small group of wood carvers that meet in the shop twice a month.

One of our most popular activities is our Christmas toy project. Last year, eight teams of six to eight members built 350 toys that were given away to several different charities for children for Christmas. We start in August to complete the toys by Thanksgiving. Some members that seldom come to the shop are there every week during the toy-building activities.

I hope that explains who we are and what our club is all about. We always have a coffee pot on, and if you want to stop by and see the shop, come anytime the shop is open.

If you have suggestions for future tips or have questions about maintenance around your home, submit them to ask.the.woodchucks@gmail.com.

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