Custom cabinetry, woodworking and woodturning by Keith Larrett
Woodturning projects
A wooden mallet is very useful in the workshop and I’ve been meaning to make one for a while. To make things a bit more interesting I decided to make one with an oval handle using off center turning. An oval handle is also more comfortable to hold than a circular handle. I made this from cherry, probably not the best of woods to use as it is not the hardest of hardwoods, but it is what I had on hand at the time.
In a recent post I mentioned I had made a Quarto Board Game for a friend of mine. It is made from walnut and oak that he sent me. It was a fun project and was done almost entirely on the lathe. I used a table saw to cut the stave sections for the sides of the box, and a drill press for the inlays on the top.
This is an article on how I made the board game. The techniques here could be adapted for a number of different games. You can download a copy of the rules for Quarto here.
Inspiration for this pen came from some of the work of Ed Davidson. You can see more of his work at http://yoyospin.com.
One of the fun things about turning a closed end pen is that it frees up more design considerations as you are not restricted by the hardware on the end of the pen.
This pen is made using the Navigator kit from Woodcraft. It is the same kit that is sold as the Baron/Sedona by Arizona Silhouette.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
I started with a piece of spalted pecan, approx. 1 1/2″ x 1 1/2″ x 7″. After mounting it between centers, I turned it round and then turned a tenon on one end that would fit in the step jaws of my chuck. I then measured 2 1/4″ from the end with the tenon, and parted the blank.
Next I mounted the blank with the tenon in the step jaws of my chuck, and drilled a 15/32″ hole 1 13/16″ deep. I checked to see that the tube for the upper barrel would fit completely in the hole.
Then I mounted the other piece in the step jaws and drilled two holes. The first hole was drilled to a depth of 2 7/8″ with a 11/32″ bit. Then I drilled a slightly larger hole, 25/64″, to a depth of 2 1/16″. I checked to see that the tube for the lower barrel fitted in the larger hole and sat flush with the face of the blank.
The reason for the step hole is two fold. Firstly the extra room created at the end of the hole by the smaller bit, allows space for the spring behind the rollerball cartridge. Secondly, a shoulder is created for the tube to rest on so that it does not go to deep into the blank while being glued in.
Having drilled all the holes in the upper and lower barrels, rough up the brass tubes and glue them in.
In order to turn the pen you need an expansion mandrel of some type. It is relatively easy to make one. Well, lets just say some people might find it relatively easy to make one! I tried a couple of times with not much success. If you would like to try you can find instructions in this tutorial.
I ended up buying a closed end mandrel for the lower barrel from Arizona Silhouette. It looks similar to a concrete expansion bolt and operates under the same principle.
Insert the mandrel in the upper barrel, tighten the bolt using a couple of wrenches and insert the mandrel in the step jaws. Take care not to over tighten the bolt, it is easy to crack the blank, especially if you are working with an acrylic blank.
Turn the blank down to approx. 5/8″ and then measure 3 1/4″ from the end and part the blank off at this point. Then turn the blank to the shape you want, sand and apply the finish. You will find that you need to support the blank with your fingers on the back side while turning to help reduce vibration. It also helps to take light cuts.
The next step is to turn the upper barrel. Because the brass tube is a different size the mandrel will not work. You have two choices at this point. The first is to buy another mandrel sized for the upper barrel. This could get expensive, especially if you want to also make closed end pens from other kits as well.
Fortunately, for the frugal amongst us, there is another solution. I got this idea from Ben “DaVinci27” Brown.
Take a spare lower barrel tube and glue it in a blank. I would recommend using 5 minute epoxy as you want to make sure you fill all the voids between the tube and the inside of the blank. Mount the blank on the lathe between a 60 degree live center and a 60 degree dead center. Turn the blank down to a diameter that makes it a snug fit inside the tube from an upper barrel. Go slow and use calipers to check your progress. Then take that blank to your band saw and cut it in half along the length. Don’t cut along the whole length of the blank, just about half way.
Insert that tube in the tube of your upper barrel, then insert the mandrel and tighten. The cut in the tube will allow it to expand as you tighten the mandrel and hold the blank snug on the mandrel.
Turn the upper blank to the shape you want, sand and finish. Once again you will probably find it necessary to support the back of the blank with your fingers while turning. Light cuts also help.
Here are a couple more shots of the finished pen.
To read Part One click here To read Part Two click here If you are interested in buying one of these tools they can be purchased at Woodchuck Lathe Tools I got a chance to turn the handles today. I mounted the blank between centers, locating a 60 degree live center in the channel opening at the headstock. After turning it round, I turned a tenon at the headstock side, sized to accept a brass coupler. I used a 1″ brass coupler cut in half. The coupler was originally just shy of 2″ long. I also marked the high points and low points of the handle and using a parting tool cut down to the final diameter of the handle at those points.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version. Here is a shot of the handle, sanded and ready to be parted off.
I used 5 minute epoxy to secure the tools in the handle and to secure the brass coupler on the tenon. I finished the handles with a couple of coats of spray shellac. While not as hard wearing as some other finishes I like the feel of shellac. It is also not as shiny as some other finishes, which is fine by me for a tool handle. Lastly shellac is very repairable, any future coats will melt into previous coats.
I’m looking forward to trying out the tools tomorrow and giving a review of them.
To read Part One click here
If you are interested in buying one of these tools they can be purchased at Woodchuck Lathe Tools
My tools arrived today! I’m glad I waited before gluing the handle blanks together. Either my 1/2″ router bit is not exactly 1/2″ or 1/2″ square bar is not 1/2″. Either way the tool bar did not fit in the grooves I had routed. The depth of the grooves was fine, but the width was a hair to small. I increased the width fractionally on the router table and the fit was perfect.
Here is a shot of one of the blanks glued and clamped. I left the bar in the groove temporarily while doing the glue up to make sure the channel lined up nicely. As soon as I was done clamping, I pulled the bar out. I also marked on the bar the depth it receded in the channels. I know I will have some clean up to do in the channels due to glue squeeze out and I want to make sure the bar is able to fit in as deeply as it did during the dry fit.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
Here are a couple of shots of the business end of the two tools. One has the carbide cutter in place, the other just the holding screw.
I’m still having a ball turning spheres! This is how I turned a hollow sphere. I first mounted a piece of wood about 3 1/2″ square by 5 1/2″ long between centers and turned it round with tenons either side sized to fit my jaw chuck. I measured the diameter of the cylinder at the center point and it was 3 1/4″. I then parted the cylinder in half.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
If you are interested in buying one of these tools they can be purchased at Woodchuck Lathe Tools
I am waiting on arrival of two tools a friend is making up for me. They are for lathe work and accept radius carbide cutter inserts. The tools are made from some 1/2″ x 1/2″ x 18″ square steel bar that I sent him. He is milling a slot in one end of the bar for the cutter to seat, as well as tapping a hole to secure the cutter. I told him not to worry about turning the other end of the tool round to insert in the handle.
I’m excited to try out the tool and so have started preparing the stock I will be using for the tool handles. My first step was to take four pieces of 4 pieces of cherry and 4 pieces of maple, each piece was 3/4″ x 3″ x 15″. I milled and cut each piece down to 5/8″ x 2 1/2″ x 15″ and glued them together.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
I then mounted a 1/2″ straight bit in my router table and raised it 1/4″ above the router table. I set the fence 1″ from the edge of the bit and also set up a stop block 4″ from the near side of the bit. Using this set up I routed a 1/4″ x 1/2″ x 4″ stopped groove in each of the four pieces.
Finally, I squared the end of each groove using hand chisels. I was tempted to glue the pieces together but decided to wait until the tools arrived so I could do a test fit of the bars in the grooves.
At the demo by Fred Holder, I attended he turned a sphere and used a set of sphere calipers. They are available online but are pricey, so I did some more searching and found a great article by Al Hockenbery. It involves a bit of math but is a fairly quick and easy way to turn a sphere on the lathe. This article describes and illustrates the process.
Edit: Since writing this article I have purchased a set of the Soren Berger Sphere Calipers. You can read my post on using them at this link ~ Instructions for Using the Soren Berger Sphere Calipers.
One of the nice things about the spheres is that they show off the end, face, and side grain in a small area. They also look so cool and feel so good to hold!
I find a nice size piece of wood to start with is 3″ x 3″ x 4 1/2″.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
First the math. You first need to turn a cylinder that is round in cross-section. Then you will turn that into an octagon and finally turn that into a 16 sided polygon before blending all the angles into a perfect circle. The pictures below illustrate this and you can see that the sides of the octagon are 0.414 x the diameter of the initial square.
Mount a piece of wood between centers. A 3″ x 3″ x 4 1/2″ piece is a nice size, yielding a sphere about 2 3/4″ diameter which fits in your hand nicely and feels good to hold. Grain orientation is not important, although it will affect your choice of turning tool. I like to use a bowl gouge to rough turn the cylinder.
Mark the center point of the cylinder and find the diameter at that point. Layout that dimension on the cylinder, centering it about your first mark.
Now turn tenons on either side of the cylinder. Turn the tenons down to a diameter of 0.414D. (D = diameter of the cylinder)
Now layout two more lines on the cylinder that are 0.414D apart and are centered around the centerline of the cylinder. Make a straight cut from these lines to the edge of the tenons. You should now have a shape that is an octagon in cross-section.
Mark the center point of each of the newly created flat areas. These two marks, along with the first mark on the centerline of the cylinder, will be on the surface of the sphere.
Turn the tenons down a bit more. Then mark the center points of each area between the lines and the edge of the flat area. These are the red lines in the image below.
Make straight cuts between adjacent red lines to turn the octagon into a 16 sided polygon. Try to make the cuts as straight as you can, you can see in the picture below that one of mine ended up a bit concave.
Using a bowl gouge or a skew held flat like a scraper, blend all the flat parts in, creating the sphere.
In order to finish the sphere and turn off the tenons it needs to be mounted between a set of cup centers. To make the cup center for the headstock side chuck a piece of scrap in a jaw chuck and hollow it out slightly. Make sure that the sphere fits against the edge of the concave are and does not bottom out in the hollow.
Next mount another piece of scrap in the jaw chuck and hollow out a v-shaped hollow. Place a 60-degree live center in the tailstock and check that it fits snugly in the v-shaped hollow. Turn a tenon on the end of the piece.
Turn the scrap piece around and remount it in the jaw chuck using the newly created tenon. Hollow a cup on this end.
Mount the sphere between the two cup centers and carefully turn the tenons off. As you can see I cut the majority of the tenon off with a handsaw.
When sanding the sphere I put a piece of high friction router mat between the cups and the sphere to protect the wood. I also re-orientate the sphere between the cup centers a number of times in order to get the sphere as round as possible and to sand the whole surface.
I needed to make a donut chuck so that I could mount a 12″ bowl on my lathe and finish off the bottom of the bowl. I have a set of cole jaws for my jaw chuck, but they will only expand 10″.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
The first step was to take a 16″ x 16″ x 3/4″ piece of plywood and find the center. I marked out three circles of 9″, 15″ and 15 3/4″ diameter. I laid out eight points on the 15″ diameter circle and drilled 5/16″ holes and inserted 1/4-20 tee nuts at each of these points.
I took another piece of 16″ x 16″ x 3/4″ plywood and placed it below the first piece. Using a transfer punch, I transferred the centers of the eight tee nuts to the second piece of plywood and then drilled 1/4″ holes at each of these points. I bolted the two pieces together using 1 1/2″ 1/4-20 bolts and cut the two pieces of plywood round, just outside of the 15 3/4″ circle. I used my jigsaw to do this as the workpiece would not have sat flush on my band saw table and I did not want the heads of the bolts to scratch my band saw table. As an aside, I used the new Xtra-Clean (T308B) blades from Bosch and was impressed at how easily they cut and how clean the cut was on both the top and bottom of the plywood.
Using my center finder I located a face plate I have dedicated to this donut chuck and attached it securely to the first piece of plywood.
I mounted the face plate and plywood pieces on the lathe and turned both pieces perfectly round. I marked a 9″ diameter circle on the front piece and drilled a 1/.4″ hole through both pieces using a drill chuck in the tail stock. I took the piece of the lathe and drilled a 5/16″ hole 3/8″ deep in the back piece of plywood and inserted a 1/4″ tee nut in that hole. Then I bolted both pieces together suing another 1 1/2″ 1/4-20 bolt.
I remounted the piece on the lathe and made a mark on the sides of the plywood pieces to help align the two pieces. Using a parting tool, I cut the 9″ diameter circle out of the front piece of plywood. I cut at an angle from the center out and took care to make sure I did not cut too deeply into the back piece of plywood. Because of the tapered cut and the center bolt the internal circle did not come loose. I had to remove all 9 bolts to take it out.
Lastly I cut a piece of high friction router pad cloth and using spray adhesive attached it to the inside face of the front section. This will help to both hold and protect the surface of the bowl.
The tee nut inserted in the center of the back piece can be used to mount a scrap piece of plywood to. A tenon that matches the internal diameter of a bowl can then be turned onto that scrap piece enabling you to mount the bowl in the donut chuck directly on center.
In my excitement at how easily the bowl mounted and how smooth and true it ran, I forgot to take a picture of the mounted bowl before I finished off the bottom. Here is a shot of the bowl mounted in the donut chuck, with the bottom finished and sanded.
This is a nice project as it requires a number of different techniques including face turning, spindle turning, drilling on the lathe and reverse mounting on tenons. The end result makes for a beautiful and useful gift.
To download these instructions complete with the pictures click here.
To download these instructions without the pictures click here. This should make it easier to print out and take into the workshop with you.
You can click on any of the images to see a larger version.
I used two pieces of cherry, a 3 1/2″ x 3 1/2″ x 3 1/2″ block and a 1″x1″x6″ piece of spindle stock. The larger piece will be used to make the top and base of the earring stand as well as to reverse chuck the top and base. The smaller piece will be used to make the upright stand of the earring stand. For the spindle stock you could easily use a pen blank. If all goes well you could actually make two tops and two bases from a piece this size.
Mount the larger block on the lathe between centers. Orient the grain so that it is perpendicular to the lathe bed, much like you would mount a bowl blank.
Turn the piece round and turn a tenon, sized for your chuck, on one end.
Remove the piece from between centers and mount it on your chuck. Re true the blank and true the front of the blank. Using a 3/8″ drill mounted in a drill chuck in the tail stock drill a hole 1″ deep. (I forgot to take a picture of the hole being drilled)
I have a jig that I purchased from Craft Supplies. The jig is used to drill the holes from which the earrings will hang. It would be very easy to make a similar jig from acrylic plastic. It is 2 1/2″ diameter and has a 3/8″ tenon on the center of one side. There are 24 3/32″ holes drilled 3/16″ from the edge of the jig. To download a scale diagram and instructions to build a jig click here. If you purchase the jig it will also come with a set of instructions for making the Earring Stand which are different to the method I chose to use.
Mount the jig in the hole drilled in the blank and then drill all 24 holes to a depth of 5/8″. The locating pin is inserted in the first hole you drill to keep the jig aligned. While the jig is mounted draw a line on the face of the blank outlining the diameter of the jig. This will define the diameter of the top of the earring stand. After removing the jig mark a line 5/8″ diameter on the face of the blank. This will define the area on which the finial of the earring stand sits.
Using a parting tool, part the blank about an inch deep and 1/2″ from the edge of the blank. This defines the top piece of the earring stand.
Turn this section down to the line that was defined by the outline of the jig. Then shape the profile of the top. Leave the center 5/8″ flat as this is where the finial will sit. Also take care to ensure the edge of the top is no more that 3/16″ thick and that the holes are not more than 3/16″ from the edge or it will be difficult to insert the earrings into the holes.
Sand the top and if you plan on using a friction polish for a finish, apply that now. Then part the top off the blank and set it aside for the time being.
True the face of the blank and the chuck the 3/8″ drill in the tailstock drill chuck again and confirm the hole in the center of the blank is 3/8″ deep. Mark a circle of 5/8″ diameter and another of 3″ diameter on the face of the blank. These will define the areas where the upright stand will sit and the diameter of the base. Also mark a line 5/8″ from the edge of the blank. This will define the total thickness of the base.
Make a parting cut about an inch deep to define the thickness of the base. Also turn the blank down to the diameter of the base.
Shape the profile of the base taking care to leave the center 5/8″ flat. Sand the base and if you plan on using a friction polish for a finish, apply that now. Part the base off and set is aside for the time being.
As you can see there is enough of the blank left over to make a second base and top. If you are planning on making two earring stands repeat the above steps and make a second base and top before moving on and finishing the bottom of each base and top.
True the face of the blank and turn a 3/8″ diameter tenon on the face. Reverse mount the base of the earring stand on the tenon. Check the fit is secure and the base is running true and then finish the bottom of the base. Turn a concave profile so that the base will sit flat. Sand and apply your finish if you are using a friction polish.
Repeat this procedure for the top of the earring stand.
Mount the spindle stock between centers and turn it round to about 3/4″ diameter. Mark out for the tenon, upright stand, tenon and finial. The measurements shown in the picture are 3/4″, 3 7/8″, 4 3/8″ and 5 3/4″ from the head stock end of the blank.
Turn the tenons to 3/8″ diameter. I use a wrench to check the diameter, calipers work as well. When making the tenons take care to undercut slightly so that the stand and finial will sit flush on the base and top.
Mark the blank with the details of the desired profile and then turn the profile of the stand and finial.
Make the starting cuts to part the tenons, checking the depth of the holes in the base and top in order to determine the length of the tenons. Do not part all the way through. Sand the piece and if you are using a friction polish apply that now.
Continue shaping the top of the finial and part the piece off at this point.
Cut the tenons using a handsaw. Do a dry fit of the whole piece checking tenon diameter and length. Adjust where necessary and then glue the four pieces together.
I finished my earring stand with a couple coats of spray lacquer.