I only want to turn wood into dowel, otherwise round bars

[richard6299]

I've bought these tools new. I had a chance to purchase a second-hand set of Crown tools, but was not sure how sharp they might be. That coloured my decision.

 

[mwinfrance]

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[Orraloon]

You will have to learn a method of sharpening or you just can't turn. That is the stark truth of it. Turning tools will go dull in a few minutes. Most cost effective way is with a bench grinder. Get or make a tool rest where you can adjust the angle.Bench Grinder Sharpening Tool Rest Jig for 6" and 8" Grinders and Sanders BG : Amazon.com.au: Home Improvement
Regards
John

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I've bought these tools new. I had a chance to purchase a second-hand set of Crown tools, but was not sure how sharp they might be. That coloured my decision.

How long do you think you'll go without sharpening the new ones? I think you might be in for a shock.

 

[vic397]

I don't know if he's been mentioned, but you could watch a video by the late (great - in my opinion) Allan Batty on using the skew chisel.

Not only is his work superb, but he also explains (and shows) exactly how to use the chisel and when. It does take practice, but if you get the hang of it you can almost forget sanding. Link beow (I hope).

https://www.google.com/search?q=ske...#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:78ea4659,vid:KfeLAHQSbqk

 

[Jacob]

...... .. Turning tools will go dull in a few minutes. .....

Which is why you really need to get into freehand sharpening on an oil stone so you can touch up an edge at very frequent intervals. Saves hours of fiddling about and your tools last much longer. Gone a bit out of fashion, which is why the old books are well worth looking at.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I knew scores of club turners, some pro and semi pro - never once did I see anyone use an oilstone or hear them ever say they used one. One or two used a diamond card on skews, but that was it. I've seen several top class demonstrators - none of them used one either.

 

[Jacob]

I knew scores of club turners, some pro and semi pro - never once did I see anyone use an oilstone or hear them ever say they used one. One or two used a diamond card on skews, but that was it. I've seen several top class demonstrators - none of them used one either.

You ought to have a go yourself and make your own mind up!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I have. Its a waste of time and effort.

 

[Jacob]

I have. Its a waste of time and effort.

Keep trying you'll get it eventually

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Why? Why would I keep practicing an inefficient way of doing something? I don't have a problem sharpening tools.

 

[Alpha-Dave]

I've bought these tools new. I had a chance to purchase a second-hand set of Crown tools, but was not sure how sharp they might be. That coloured my decision.

Being able to sharpen the tools is a critical part of woodturning. The ony exception to that is for the people who use replaceable-tip carbide tools, but the cost and quality and ease-of-use are very different.

How much wood do you cut before you need to sharpen a normal chisel or bench plane? I would want to sharpen a chisel after a foot of dovetails, which need several cuts each, maybe 20x 1” cuts x 12 dovetails, so 240” of cutting , which is about 6m. Compare that to turning a 3” diameter blank at 1000 rpm, the surface will be going at 9.4” per rotation, so 9,400” per minute, or about 24 m per minute, which for a direct comparison would mean sharpening every 15 seconds!

Now the cut being taken are very light compared to a bench chisel, so may last 10x longer, and HSS is used rather than carbon steel, so may last 10x longer again but you will still want to touch up the edge after 10-20 min of work (tool-contact time, which is significantly less than the time spent at the lathe).

 

[Orraloon]

Looks like this is turning into a sharpening thread and we all know they can roll on for ever about what method is best and we mostly talk them round in circles. That said its a woodworking fact of life that you have to have some sharpening method to be able to work wood. Turning tools sharpening takes a slightly different approach than bench tools as the aim is to quickly touch up the tool and carry on turning. You will have a number of sharpenings for most items you turn. Usually done on a grinder. Just a primary bevel and used strait off the grinder wheel with no secondary hone. The skew can be honed but it also must be kept as a single bevel as turning tools ride the bevel in use. What you want to spend on this is open ended but I searched around for something that gets you there on a budget as a starting point. I found this video that is similar to what I do. Phil Pascoe mentioned Keith Rowley's book Turning. A Foundation Course and its worth hunting down as a way of getting started in woodturning. I based my turning sharpening on Mr Rowleys good advice when I started and and am still using it.
Grinding Station - Sharpening Woodturning Tools, Chisels & Cutting Irons - YouTube
Regards
John

 

[Stevekane]

Im asking this just as a matter of my own intrest, it looks like the OP wants to make precision turned pieces,,but is it really possible to do this on a wood turning lathe without great experiance and practice? I would have thought a metal turning lathe would be more suited to the job?
Steve.

 

[Alpha-Dave]

Im asking this just as a matter of my own intrest, it looks like the OP wants to make precision turned pieces,,but is it really possible to do this on a wood turning lathe without great experiance and practice? I would have thought a metal turning lathe would be more suited to the job?
Steve.

Short answer, yes: a person’s ability to make accurate parts on a lathe far exceeds the potential movement of the wood during seasonal variations (a percent or two).

Longer answer, still yes: there are many types of joint, but predominantly they are either glued or glue-free.
1) For glued joints then there needs to be a small gap for the wet glue to fill so that there is enough glue to get into the fibres/surface texture. There are companies that supply wooden parts (dowels, dominoes) that have significant surface texturing to allow one of the surfaces to hold some glue during and after insertion.
2) For unglued joints the parts are ofter wedged to force one part to expand to force the joint closed, here no surface texture is needed, but still a relatively lose or tight fit before wedging does not make a huge difference.

Even longer answer: maybe: I have heard of wooden parts being used for relatively high precision mechanical and rotating components in clocks both modern and old, and in engineering things like the bearings blocks for ship’s drive shaft (massive blocks of lignum vitae), but those are speclist applications. I have made wooden hinges, e.g. for the roof of a toy dog kennel, and the tolerances were fine.

In this example I had to use the lathe to tune the outer part of the dowels because it’s impossible to drill a centre accurately (or it’s certainly far easier to make the outside concentric with the inner than the other way round). I used brass tube for the central shaft, but for the dimensions needed by the OP, then the outer diameters here should be adequate.

 

[Stevekane]

The dog kennel was an ingenious build Dave, and intresting tip about boreing the hole first hopfully thats a tip that will stick in my mind and come in useful. My couple of goes on a wood lathe achived a couple of handles for chisels but I struggled to get them a perfect match,,I suppose practice would make quite a difference. When I made a number of 1/2inch oak dowels I used a crude dowel cutter I copied from the internet, and the finish was quite rough with a spiral running down its length, however in practice they worked really well holding a good quantity of glue and I was very pleased with them.
Steve

 

[HamsterJam]

I have successfully turned large dowels (or cylindrical loose tenons, depending on how you look at it) on the lathe. These needed to match the mortices cut with a forstner bit.

 

[richard6299]

Have you given any thought to sharpening these tools?

Hi. No I haven't. I'll need to address that.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

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[mwinfrance]

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