I was getting tired of reaching for my calipers and setting them to my chuck diameter every time I needed to turn a tenon. The alternative was trying to “guesstimate” the diameter needed and very often I would turn the tenon to small. So I made a spindle and tenon gauge.
I have a set of forstner bits and they go from 1/4″ to 2 1/8″ diameter, in 1/8″ increments. I figured that while I was busy making the gauge, I might as well go ahead and include all these diameters.
I used a piece of 1/4″ hardboard. It was thicker than my parting tool, so I ran it through my drum sander a couple of times until it was just slightly thinner than my parting tool. This is probably not necessary for most applications, but I thought it may be useful occasionally when I wanted to make a parting cut in the middle of a piece and not have to widen it in order to insert the gauge.
Then I drew two lines down each side of the hardboard, just over one inch from each edge. I set my drill fence so the center of the forstner bit was positioned over one of the lines. Then, using a scrap piece of wood as a backer board, I started drilling holes, from big to small, down one side and up the other side.
When all the holes were drilled, I set my table saw fence to the line I had previously drawn, and with two passes, cut all the circles in half.
The gauge now hangs within easy reach of my lathe and is perfect for sizing tenons and checking spindle diameters. A quick, easy and cheap solution that makes my work flow at the lathe easier 🙂
If you have a hint or tip feel free to share in the comments section.
A couple of months ago a demonstration at my woodturning club prompted me to start experimenting with dyes. Dyeing and coloring is one of those subjects that can be pretty intimidating. There are so many colors out there where do you start? Well, my first step was to buy myself a color wheel. I also spent some time researching what type of dyes to start with and eventually settle on TransTint Dyes. The next step was to decide which colors to buy. After looking at the number of colors available and the cost of the dyes, I decided that I would just buy the primary colors and black. I figured that with those colors I could mix any other color that I might want.
With that decision behind me I placed my order for a bottle of red, blue, green and black dyes. While waiting for the package to arrive I took a trip to Harbor Freight and got some 8oz squeeze bottles. I also went to Walgreens and got a small syringe for accurately measuring the dyes. If ever you want to feel like a crack addict, going to the drug store and asking for a small syringe will do that for you. Although they very kindly didn’t charge me for it, the kid at the pharmacy looked me over twice and also asked to see my drivers licensee before giving me the syringe!
The package of dyes arrived and, feeling like a mad chemist, I opened it up ready to start mixing. Well, who knew that green is not a primary color!!! I guess if I’d taken the time to really look at the color wheel I brought I might have know. Apparently the laws of physics/chemistry weren’t going to be changed just because I had brought the wrong color dye, so a trip to my local Woodcraft and I had a bottle of yellow dye to add to my collection. (“My local Woodcraft” is a relative term here involving a three hour return trip).
My plan was to mix up a “master” bottle of the three primary colors, red, yellow and blue, and then use those to mix up “master” bottles of the secondary colors, orange, green and violet. From these six colors, along with the black, I figured I could mix up any other color I wanted on a “as needed” basis.
TranTint dyes can be mixed with water or alcohol. They can also be added to common finishes including shellac, water based lacquer and polyurethane and most oil based finishes. I chose to mix the dye with a 50/50 solution of denatured alcohol and lacquer thinners. This would have the advantage of not raising the grain of the workpiece. The one disadvantage of doing this is that the solution dries very quickly after application. As you only get an idea of what the final color will look like when the dye is first applied and wet this does not allow for much time to see if the color is to your liking.
The dyes need to mixed in the following proportion, 1 oz of dye to 1 quart of water or alcohol. If you’re not interested in doing the math, this came to 7.5 ml of dye to be added to my 8 oz solution of alcohol and lacquer thinners.
I finally got a chance to play with the chatter tool I made. My initial experiments were pretty disappointing. The tool was “screeching” as it is supposed to, but I only seemed to be able to put spiral grooves on the test piece. My first thought was that the blade was not thick enough and I was getting too much “deflection” and not enough “chatter”. I had used on old jigsaw blade, so I took an old sawzall blade and cut and shaped that. Even though it was wider, and offer less give, I was still just getting spiral grooves.
So I took the two blades back to the grinder and ground a very slight bevel on the edges. More importantly I rounded over the point of the blade so that instead of coming to a sharp point it came to a blunt, slightly round point. Immediately I started to see improvements! Both the jig saw blade and the sawzall blade worked great, although they did produce different patterns.
There are no shortage of patterns you can get with the chatter tool. Whether any of them are repeatable is open to debate though! A number of variables affect the pattern.
The amount of the blade sticking out the tool.
The distance from the tool rest to the work piece.
The speed of the lathe.
How hard you push the tool into the work piece.
How quickly you move the cutting edge across the work piece.
How many times you move the cutting edge across the work piece.
The angle the cutting edge is presented.
The image below shows some examples. I colored the patterns with a black permanent marker so they would show better in the image.
A chatter tool is used primarily in end grain, so applications include embellishments on box lids, spinning tops etc. The chatter tool will work better on hardwoods than softwoods.
After spending an hour or so playing with the tool, I feel the most important variables are lathe speed and distance of the tool rest from the work piece. For the most part the tool is presented so that the blade is horizontal and the handle is closer to you than the blade. The tool rest is about 4 to 6″ from the workpiece and lathe speed is around 1000 rpm. The blade is pushed into the wood and then pulled from the center to the edge. Rotating the tool slightly counter clockwise will change the pattern achieved, but it will also cause the tool to move towards the edge of the work piece a lot faster!! I found lathe speeds between 750 and 1800 worked with an optimum range between 1000 and 1200.
Last weekend our woodturning club, North Florida Woodturning Association, had the good fortune of hosting Al Hockenbery and his wife Sherry for a demonstration and hands on session. The demonstration was an all day demo on Saturday and the hands on session, with six of the club members was on Sunday.
Al was a great demonstrator! He both informed and entertained. Edutainment at it’s best. One of the things I really enjoyed was that he shared many hints and tips as he demonstrated that were not necessarily part of the demo, but an opportunity in the demo arose where he was able to segue and share more of his woodturning experience.
He demonstrated a number of pieces to us, including a natural edge bowl, rough turning a large salad bowl, a natural edge hollow form and his “ball in a ball”.
Turning a natural edge bowlTurning a natural edge bowlHollowing the natural edge bowlThe finished bowlShaping the outside of a natural edge hollow formShaping the outside of a natural edge hollow formHolding a wooden ball for hollowing using a Strata ChuckHollowing the wooden ball so that a golf ball can be insertedTesting the golf ball for fitHollowing out a large salad bowlHollowing out a large salad bowl
I’ve been wanting to try some different embellishment techniques, one of which was chatter work. However I kept on balking at the price of a new chatter tool. I decided to make my own. It cost me $3.00 and a hour or two on a Sunday afternoon.
I got a 1/2″ x 10″ nipple from the plumbing department at the home improvement store, along with a 3/4″ long 1/4 20 bolt. The rest of the materials I used were in the shop already including a used jigsaw blade.
I mounted the pipe between centers on the lathe and after a bit of sanding it was nice and shiny. I then cut the threads off one end and drilled and tapped a 1/4 20 thread about 3/4″ back from that end.
The next step was to mount a cherry pen blank in a chuck and turn it down to 1/2″ so that if fit inside the pipe. I only turned down the first couple of inches, and then put it in a vise and cut it lengthwise. This off cut was then glued into the pipe with CA glue, the bolt served as a clamp.
After turning the block of wood to be used as a handle round, I drilled it to fit the the OD of the pipe. Unfortunately, the OD of the pipe was around 13/16″ and the only forstner bits I had were 3/4″ and 7/8″. So I drilled with the 3/4″ and then widened the hole using a square edge scraper until the pipe fit inside. The image below show the handle shaped and sanded, just prior to being parted off.
I’m playing with dyes at the moment, so I applied a red dye to the handle and then a couple of coats of shellac. While I was waiting for the shellac to dry, I ground the teeth off the jigsaw blade, shaped the point of the blade and bent it as in the image below.
The completed tool, ready for testing! Did I mention how nice and shiny it is!
I’ll show some pictures in a future post of the results from the tool. I also have a couple more jig saw blades and some sawzall blades. I plan on experimenting a bit with the different blades and profiles and see what sort of results I get.
If you’ve made a chatter tool let me know what type of blade and profile you got the best results with by posting a comment. Thanks.
Uphill or downhill. Cutting with the grain or against the grain. Understanding how the grain is orientated on the lathe and which direction to cut in order to get the smoothest cuts possible can be confusing.
Brian Clifford has a great article on his site The Woodturners Workshop which illustrates these concepts very clearly. Here is an brief extract from the article. To read the full article please visit Brian’s site here.
7.1 Introduction
In the previous chapter, in thinking about the way the tool cuts, three important factors were temporarily ignored. These are :
the question of grain and its direction
the rotation of the work-piece
the fact that the cutting edge is often held at an angle to the direction in which the wood is moving (the slicing cut)
7.2 The concept of grain
The cells of the wood, which take the form of hollow cylinders, join together to form strands of fibres which lie in a uniform direction which is more or less axial either to the trunk or to its offshoots. The lay of the fibres is commonly referred to as the ‘grain’.
Diagram 7.1 Primary forms of cutDiagram 7.1 shows a block of wood in which the grain is running longitudinally. Three tools are shown as if about to make cuts in the directions indicated by the arrows. These illustrate the three primary forms of cut; as defined in the common expressions of:
cutting along the grain (A);
cutting across the grain (B);
cutting end grain (C).
In practice of course, particularly in woodturning, there is an infinite range of variations on these cuts. Not only can any number of intermediate positions between those shown be taken up but the edge of the tool does not necessarily have to be held at 90 degrees to the direction in which the wood is moving. It should be noted that in Diagram 7.1 the wood is assumed to be stationary and the tool to be moving. Often, in woodturning both the wood and the tool are moving, but with the wood moving faster than the tool. For the purposes of analysis, in this particular context, this does not matter; all that we are concerned with here is the movement of the wood and the cutting edge in relation to each other.
7.3 Cutting along the grain
Anybody who has worked wood with a hand plane will know that it is desirable to plane with the grain. Diagram 7.2 illustrates the common situation in which the fibres of the wood lie at an angle to the edges of the wood block.
Diagram 7.2 Planing with and against the grainWhen the wood is planed with the grain any splitting between the fibres takes place above and in front of the cutting edge, which subsequently severs the fibres neatly, so leaving a clean surface, as shown in Diagram 7.3.
Diagram 7.3 Cutting with the grain Based on: Bruce Hoadley, Understanding Wood, The Taunton Press (1980) – p150
If an attempt is made to plane against the grain the cutting edge picks up the ends of the fibres, lifting them out of the wood, so that they break off in an irregular manner leaving a rough finish. This is illustrated in Diagram 7.4.
Diagram 7.4 Cutting against the grain Based on: Bruce Hoadley, Understanding Wood, The Taunton Press (1980) – p150
I recently purchased a set of Rockler’s Bench Cookies. I’ve been reading about them all over the internet and no doubt I’m probably the last woodworker in the world to have purchased a set 🙂 I was excited to try them out and thought I would combine it with an article about router feed direction and bit rotation.
I use a router a lot in my workshop, both hand held and table router. However, I can remember when I got my first router and the learning curve I went through figuring out which direction to move the router when routing by hand or the workpiece when routing on the table router. Hopefully I can help others out and make that learning curve not quite as exciting!
Essentially the workpiece always needs to be feed into the bit, so the first thing you need to know is which way is the bit rotating. Lets deal with the table mounter router first. Hold out your right hand in a classic “thumbs up” gesture. Imagine your hand is the router and your right thumb is the router bit. The direction of the router bit follows the curve of your fingers. In this case, it is counter clockwise. You can see this clearly in the picture below.
Now rotate your right hand into a “thumbs down” gesture. Again imagine your hand is the router and your right thumb is the router bit. The direction of the router bit is still indicated by the curve of your fingers, in this case it is clockwise. You can see this in the picture below.
This “right-hand thumb rule” applies to almost anything that spins, faucets, right hand thread screws etc.
So, moving back to the router table, you can see that in order to feed the workpiece into the router bit, you need to feed from right to left, assuming you are standing facing the fence. By feeding from right to left you are feeding the workpiece against the direction of rotation of the bit. The natural reaction as the workpiece contacts with the bit is to push the workpiece back towards you. By controlling the workpiece, by hand and through the use of featherboards, you prevent this from happening.
Feeding from left to right, the rotation of the bit would grab the workpiece and pull it forcefully from right to left. This can happen in the blink of an eye and the danger is, aside from ruining the workpiece, that you don’t release it and your fingers are pulled towards the router bit.
For the same reason the fence always needs to be positioned so that side of the router bit that is furthest away from the fence is doing the cutting. To illustrate, suppose you need to route a groove or dado that is 1″ wide, but the largest bit you have is a 3/4″ straight bit. Obviously the groove will have to be cut with two passes. The first pass will form a 3/4″ groove and then the fence can be moved 1/4″ in order to make the groove a full 1″ wide after the second pass. No problem.
However, it is very important that the fence be moved in the right direction before the second pass. Moving the fence closer to the router bit would mean that the side of the router bit that is closest to the fence is doing the cutting. Remember the way the bit is rotating? This would cause the bit to pull the workpiece away from you forcefully. The following picture shows what not to do!!
The correct method is to move the fence away from the router bit so that the 1/4″ section of the groove you are removing with the second pass is on the side of the router bit farthest from the fence. The following picture show the correct position of the fence relative to the router bit. By setting up for the second pass this way you are once again feeding the workpiece into the direction of rotation of the bit.
Cuts like this need to be planned very carefully to ensure that the correct side of the router bit is doing the cutting.
Moving back to the hand held router, there are two different scenarios which determine feed direction. Imagine a circular picture frame that you need to profile both the external and internal edges of. Which direction to you rout?
Hold your right hand out again with fingers closed except your thumb and index finger. Imagine your hand is the router. If your right thumb is pointing to the workpiece then your index finger is showing the direction of travel of the router. Take a look at the picture below.
You can see that when routing the outside edge of the picture frame, you need to move the router in a counter clockwise direction. When routing the inside edge of the picture frame, you need to move the router in a clockwise direction.
I have found these two “right hand” memory aids very useful in determining router bit rotation and router feed direction. I hope you do to.
I’ll end the article with a short video clip showing the Rockler Bench Cookies supporting a workpiece I was making some test cuts on. I found they held the workpiece securely and it was nice to have it raised above the table. I did find that I needed to lightly support the workpiece with my inboard hand to prevent it from tipping slightly. I’m sure that if the workpiece was wider or if I had been using an offset base on the router, this would not have been necessary. I can also see the Bench Cookies will be useful for other applications, sanding and finishing are two that come to mind.
In full disclosure, the links are affiliate links. If you purchase anything from Rockler via the links, Rockler will send me buckets of money and I’ll be able to quit my day job and play in my workshop every day. Not necessarily a bad thing 🙂
I finally completed the knife display case and delivered it to the lady who commissioned it. She was very happy with the case, which is the most important thing. It is a wedding anniversary gift for her husband. His collection of Harley knives has been sitting in the closet for many years, so now he will have them out on display.
The case is made from Tiger Maple and African Mahogany and is approx. 16″ x 32″. The joints are inlaid half blind dovetails. The wooden hinges are made from tiger maple. The pockets for the knives were routed with the Daisy Pin Router and then were flocked. A french cleat on the back of the display will allow it to be hung on the wall. It is pretty heavy and I thought a french cleat would be the safest means of hanging it.
Choosing and installing hinges has always been a frustrating part of the process of making a hinged box. The array of hinges available is staggering, yet often it is difficult to find just the right hinge for a particular project. I’m also guilty of not planning far enough ahead, and so when it comes time to install a hinge my choices are severally restricted because of the thickness of the wood I’ve used or the design of a particular box. Lastly I’m nervous about mortising for a hinge, messing it up and destroying all the work I’ve put into building a box.
While trying to decide on a hinge for the knife display case, all these factors came into play. In addition I had a lot of details that I did not want detracted from by a shiny metal hinge. I did some research and thought I would try make some wooden hinges. To my surprise I found them easy to make and install. They also looked really nice, and I thought they would add to the overall look of the case.
I milled some maple to half inch thick and 1 3/4″ wide. The width was determined by the finger joint layout, I was using a 1/4″ straight bit in the finger joint template on my Leigh D4R jig. The joints could just as easily made using a jig on a table saw or router table.
Using a 1/4″ round over bit in my router table I rounded over the ends of each piece.
Using the finger joint jig, I routed pins in both ends of one board, and sockets in both ends of the other board.
Each board was then cross cut in half and a test fit revealed a nice snug finger joint. I then pulled the joints apart by about 1/16″ and clamped the pairs together against my drill press fence. The plywood in the image ensured a clean exit hole. It is important that the drill be perpendicular to the table. The entry and exit holes need to be in perfect alignment on each side or the hinge will not open nicely.
After drilling, and before removing from the clamps, I inserted a 1/8″ brass rod cut to length into the hole, and two wooden hinges were complete, ready to be cut to fit and installed.
I planned to make inlaid half blind dovetail joints for the frame of the knife display case. The frame is made from African Mahogany and the inlays are tiger maple. This article will show how I made the joints. For more information on the Leigh Jig please visit their website. The article which I followed is one of Leigh’s technical bulletins. Their manuals are very well written and illustrated. Another excellent source for information on the Leigh Jigs is Al Navas’s blog, Sandal Woods.
When making half blind dovetails with the Leigh Jig it is critical to understand the following:
Bit selection is based on the thickness of the pin board.
The bit selected will only produce one specific cutting depth. If you have the bit set to low the joint will be too tight, if you have the bit set to high the joint will be too loose. Only one depth of cut will make a perfect joint.
The pins and the tails are both routed with the same bit.
The scale setting determines how much the pins protrude from the tails. You only want the pins to protrude by about 1/64″ to make for easy clean up of the joint.
The process for making inlaid half blind dovetail joints consists of first making a set of end on end half blind dovetails with two pieces of contrasting woods. Then making a regular half blind dovetail joint where the tails are smaller.
The first step was to prepare the lumber to the right dimensions. While I was doing this I also prepared a couple of test pieces to use in setting up the router and jig and to practice the joint on. I marked all the pieces with white chalk, indicating the sides of the frames (the tail boards) and the front/back of the frame (the pin boards). I also marked the show side or outside of the frame.
As well as the four sides of the frame, I also needed to prepare a spacer board, the inlay board and two shims. The spacer board is used on the Leigh Jig to rest the guide fingers on. The shims are used to help set the fingers of the jig when doing the inlay. The inlay board and shims needed to be milled to a particular thickness. The pin and tail boards are 5/8″ thick and I wanted an inlay of 1/16″ thickness. I was using the 120-8 cutter (router bit) which has a 14 degree angle and a cutting depth of 7/16″.
The inlay board thickness needed to be equal to the cutting depth + inlay thickness. i.e 7/16″ + 1/16″ = 1/2″
The shim thickness was determined by the following formula in the Leigh Bulletin: inlay thickness x 1.28 i.e 1/16″ x 1.28 = 0.08″ (The angle of the cutter bit determines the factor by which you multiply the inlay thickness by in order to determine the shim thickness.
Having prepared all the lumber the next step was to layout the fingers on the jig. As my board was only 2 1/2″ wide there were not going to be many dovetails! It is important to make sure that you have room for at least two shim thickness between each pair of fingers. The guide fingers need to be moved by this amount later in the proceedings.
The assembly is then rotated into the half blind pins mode with the scale set to the thickness of the tail board. The pin board is placed horizontally in the jig and moved forward so that it touches the tail board that is vertical in the jig. You can see in the image below that the tail board is set low enough that the router bit will not touch it!
The pin board is then routed. This is not the normal procedure when making half blind dovetails using the Leigh Jig. Normally the tail board is routed first. For inlaid half blind dovetails the pin board needs to be routed first so that an inlay can be glued into the pins.
The assembly is now rotated to the half blind tails mode and the inlay board is placed horizontally in the jig. It is moved forward so that it is flush with the front face of the tail board mounted vertically in the jig. The inlay board is routed out. When routing the inlay board you need to make sure you route back far enough so that there is enough of a tail to fill the tail sockets.
After making a test fit I took the inlay board to my cross cut sled on my table saw and cut off a couple inches of the end which had been routed. I then glued the inlay into the pin board. As you can see in the image below I did this on both ends of the pin board.
Once the glue had cured, I took the piece to my cross cut sled again and cut the inlay board flush with the end of the pin board.
Now comes the magic trick. With the jig assembly still in the half blind tails mode the guide fingers need to be moved so that the next set of pins and tails that are cut are slightly smaller than the first set. The Leigh Bulletin does a great job of explaining how the guide fingers need to be moved, I’ll do my best here.
The right hand fingers are loosened and moved to the right by one shim thickness. They are then tightened. The left hand fingers are then loosened, slid to the left so that two shims fit between the left and right fingers, then the left finger is tightened. The half pin guides need only to be moved inwards by one shim thickness. The easy way to do this is to move the “spare” fingers (the ones to the far left and right of the joint that are just used to rest the router on) flush to the half pin guides. Then the half pin guides are loosened, slid in by the the thickness of one shim and tightened. The “spare” guides are then moved back out. It sounds pretty complicated, but it is actually fairly simple to do.
Having moved the guides, and with the assembly still in the half blind tails mode, the tail board is routed out. As you can see in the image below the tail board is mounted vertical in the jig and raised so that it touches the underside of the guide fingers.
We’re nearly there!! The assembly is rotated to the half blind pins mode. The pin board with the inlay is mounted horizontally in the jig and moved forward so that it touches the tail board that is vertical in the jig. Again you can see in the image below that the tail board is set low enough that the router bit will not touch it!
The pin board is routed out and finally the inlaid joint is revealed! I don’t need to tell you how exciting a moment this is!
The results of all those steps, an inlaid half blind dovetail joint.
