Turning without a lathe.
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Here you are my version of an absolute poor-man’s lathe. I have my PS router plane almost finished, but I can’t find handles on a size adequate for this tool. All that I I’ve found are small versions of handles, so I began to thinking about made them, but I haven’t a lathe.
I know that Paul has am excelent video about how to doing them with hand tools, but I wanted to try how it could be doing them on a “lathe way”. Since I haven’t a lathe I have made a poor-man’s version.
Material: an electric drill on a Wolfcraft stand I have since 2002, about 18 cm of M6 threaded bar, 4 M6 nuts, 2 washers, some scraps of wood and a HSS 10×10 mm bar. I begin with the pieces of wood converted from square to octagon first (hand plane) and to an almost a cilynder after (hand plane again and scraper). The washers and the nuts clamp the wood in place (the exterior ones make the counter-nut thread and maintain the interior ones secure with the wood). The M6 bar make the axis and the scraps of wood, adequately clamped, do the rest. The axis goes to a hole made at the same height on a scrap of wood, lubricated with grease for easy movement. As fortune tourning gouge, I’ve used an HSS steel bar with a bevel make on the grinder.
Of course, for using this kind of “lathe”, the pieces of wood must have a squared and passing-thorugh 6 mm hole, made with the same technique that PS uses for drilling the holes on the router body.
After that, all is working with extreme careful and lots of patience. A final touch of sandpaper by hand or around a dowel does the work. Judge yourselves, but I think that I can be very happy with the results. The wood, by the way, has come out from an beech-made meeting table that was discarted where I work. They thought about throwing it away, but I kept part of the wood for upcyling it.
I don’t know why pics don’t appear in order, but you can imagine it.[attachment file=”747534″]
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This topic was modified 1 year, 10 months ago by
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This topic was modified 1 year, 10 months ago by
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This topic was modified 1 year, 10 months ago by
Nice! I have thought about trying to make a small lath powered by a drill. Every time I see one, I get the urge but somehow always get distracted. Maybe I will try. One thing I wonder about: drills are designed to push straight down, which is what we do when drilling. They are not specifically designed to withstand side pressure. I wonder if using them like this can damage the chuck or even the spindle over time. Have you ever seen comments anywhere about this issue?
Well, I don’t have noticed anything on my drill yet. It’s a “budget drill”, bought in a super-store 21 years ago, made in China of course, but it is behaving like a amazing sturdy drill. It has a power of 810 W, and continues working as the first day, without noise, vibration or loosenes. In fact, I use it for anything except drilling: shaking paint, as a grinder, with the brass circular brush when derusting an old tool (this has been its principal use in these 20 years)… everything except drilling. Now its working like a lathe-motor.
I suppose that if I use enough time as a lathe it will wear due to side pressure, but that has been the reason for not buying a lathe: I only need one very from time to time, so it won’t work hardly in this task. About your question, I haven’t seen comments about this, but I haven’t done an exhaustive searching either, that’s the true. Perhaps this task will be the one wich make this drill grow old.
Paul has made videos about making a plane front knob without a lathe.
The same method could be used.[postquote quote=747771]
I know it, Benoit. I’ve said it before.
Well, these are the knobs mounted on the router plane. I’ve stained them on chestnut to have contrast with the router body.
Very nice, thanks for posting these.
Outstanding job! How did you do such a beautiful job without a lathe ? Please tell me the secret. I started working on a set of knobs with a piece of walnut and using just my scrollsaw. They look OK but somewhat chunky. Did you use a drill to round the knob out or do everything by hand.
Thanks,
Dave GrindelWell, Dave. I haven’t used a true lathe, but the job is not made by hand, since I’ve used a poor man’s version made with a drill mounted on a horizontal stand. You can see it in the pictures.
For rough rounding I used a “turning gouge” made from a piece of hss steel. For final rounding I used sandpaper in a dowel. Working very carefully, very slowly and with lots of patience, this was the result.
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This topic was modified 1 year, 10 months ago by
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