What to add to my turning tool collection?

[Phil Pascoe]

You can buy HSS round and flat bar on Amazon/Ebay cheaply enough and make your own scrapers and round skews.

I remember club lathes had five tools each - a parting tool, a bowl gouge, a spindle gouge, a roughing gouge and a skew. They were deemed enough for 95% of turning.

 

[justinpeer]

Had a thought this morning, dangerous, I know and then grabbed a grinder and a couple of flap wheels to attack those Sorby spindle gouges. Half an hour later and after a trip to the grinder, they now look like this.

The larger one doesn't fit in the oneway guide so that was done freehand. They're by no means perfect but I think they look at least useable for now.

Which gives me this currently as the starter set for spindles, ½" & ¾" spindle gouges and ½" & 1" skews.

and leaves a parting tool, bowl gouge and roughing gouge to acquire and possibly a ⅜" spindle gouge in HSS for smaller work.

For the extra £10 I think I'll get the 1 ¼" roughing gouge over the ¾" as I have an endless supply of logs from the woodland, ⅜" bowl gouge seems to be most recommended and just leaves the parting tool style and size to be decided.

 

[justinpeer]

You can buy HSS round and flat bar on Amazon/Ebay cheaply enough and make your own scrapers and round skews.

I remember club lathes had five tools each - a parting tool, a bowl gouge, a spindle gouge, a roughing gouge and a skew. They were deemed enough for 95% of turning.

Good to know for the future that I can get HSS bar, that hadn't occurred to me and I like making my own tools.
The starter set sounds a lot like what I'm trying to put together

 

[Vulcan]

Dovetail scraper.

Not needed IMO. I made that mistake and then saw several professionals using the tip of a skew to do the job. The redundant dovetail scraper was reground into something more useful.

 

[Vulcan]

Had a thought this morning, dangerous, I know and then grabbed a grinder and a couple of flap wheels to attack those Sorby spindle gouges. Half an hour later and after a trip to the grinder, they now look like this.

How sharp a gouge can be made is partly determined by the flute. I’ve read some turners spend time polishing the flute, not only to give a keener edge but also to eject shavings more easily. Not so critical on a bowl gouge as many don’t go beyond about 240g when sharpening. On a spindle gouge though an experienced turner can get a good finish straight from the tool with a suitably honed gouge.
I have an 800g belt for my grinder and can get a very sharp edge on some of my gouges.

 

[Tris]

Those two unhandled scrapers have what look suspiciously like file tangs on them. Be careful you don't have repurposed files amongst the handled ones. Files were often ground down for turning tools but are usually too brittle. Definitely don't want one shattering on you

 

[HamsterJam]

Good to know for the future that I can get HSS bar, that hadn't occurred to me and I like making my own tools.
The starter set sounds a lot like what I'm trying to put together

If you like making tools you can fashion a thin parting tool from a mechanical hacksaw blade.
Great for parting off box lids when you don’t want to lose much material so the grain stays aligned.

 

[justinpeer]

Those two unhandled scrapers have what look suspiciously like file tangs on them. Be careful you don't have repurposed files amongst the handled ones. Files were often ground down for turning tools but are usually too brittle. Definitely don't want one shattering on you

There were definitely a bunch of tools made out of old files in the box I was given, I've set those aside for other metalworking things. The scrapers that are partially painted black seem to be a set and don't have any obvious markings left over that look like they were files. Is that style of tang not common on turning tools then?

 

[Tris]

There were definitely a bunch of tools made out of old files in the box I was given, I've set those aside for other metalworking things. The scrapers that are partially painted black seem to be a set and don't have any obvious markings left over that look like they were files. Is that style of tang not common on turning tools then?

That style wouldn't be out of place on some older tools, but given the similarity I thought it was worth mentioning. Hopefully they are handmade from something decent, if you get into David Springett's stuff they will come in useful

 

[justinpeer]

Thanks for mentioning, definitely something to keep my eye on when I use them.

 

[justinpeer]

Meanwhile, I've just ordered a 1 ¼" roughing gouge, ⅜" bowl gouge and ¼" parting tool, all by Hamlet. Should now give me a suitable small set of tools to experiment with and I have some spare carbon steel tools to explore different grinds with as I need to.

Thanks for all the help and advice.

 

[Lakeburch]

Had a thought this morning, dangerous, I know and then grabbed a grinder and a couple of flap wheels to attack those Sorby spindle gouges. Half an hour later and after a trip to the grinder, they now look like this.

View attachment 189781

View attachment 189782

The larger one doesn't fit in the oneway guide so that was done freehand. They're by no means perfect but I think they look at least useable for now.

Which gives me this currently as the starter set for spindles, ½" & ¾" spindle gouges and ½" & 1" skews.
View attachment 189783
and leaves a parting tool, bowl gouge and roughing gouge to acquire and possibly a ⅜" spindle gouge in HSS for smaller work.

For the extra £10 I think I'll get the 1 ¼" roughing gouge over the ¾" as I have an endless supply of logs from the woodland, ⅜" bowl gouge seems to be most recommended and just leaves the parting tool style and size to be decided.

It could just be the light, so just ignore me if it is, but those 2 skews look to have a **** of a hollow grind on them...so much so that I'd say they are not safe to use.

 

[justinpeer]

It could just be the light, so just ignore me if it is, but those 2 skews look to have a **** of a hollow grind on them...so much so that I'd say they are not safe to use.

I'll take a better close up of them. I did them on an 8" grinder.

 

[justinpeer]

Hopefully you can see them better in these. My first go at sharpening skews and just following the instructions that came with the grinder. Freehand on the plate thats part of the one way system. Not completely even angle on each side but hopefully I’ve not gone too far wrong. Please let me know if I have.

 

[Paul Hannaby]

Thanks Paul, that’s good to know. Sounds like buying a new spindle and bowl gouge will be the way forward so I have something decent to start with.

Any opinion on which sort of parting tool to get?

I enjoy bringing tools back to life so it’s something I’ll work on now and then and see how I get on with them.

Either a 1/8" or 1/4" straight sided parting tool would be a good place to start.

 

[Lakeburch]

Hopefully you can see them better in these. My first go at sharpening skews and just following the instructions that came with the grinder. Freehand on the plate thats part of the one way system. Not completely even angle on each side but hopefully I’ve not gone too far wrong. Please let me know if I have.

View attachment 189849

View attachment 189850

View attachment 189851

They look great, sorry about doubting you earlier!