1st Time Turner - Soon Anyway

JJ Now you have gone and done it. The addiction is about to start in. Just a word of advice, free and worth every penny. While you may want a chuck in the future, it is not necessary. First thing I would say to do is make or buy a grinding jig. In fact, if you are not sure you need or want one, copy mine and try it. It saves a lot of time and anxiety in sharpening. I also think that is is safer for a turner, especially a new one, to have properly sharpened tools.

Darrel,

Thanks. I saw your great website the other day - great info. I'm sure I'll be back there many times in the near future as my habit progresses. New to turning, but have played at wood and metal working for a while, so I am pretty well set with grinding/sharpening equipment and am used to sharpening just about anything.

-jj

Then you may substitute a confident hand for the holding device at the grinder. I like to have the centerline of my grinder up at the same height as the centerline of my lathe, making the sharpening process just a repeat of the motions I use to make a cut. The objective in both cases is to avoid digging in, though the potential damage is, of course to the tool versus the piece in sharpening.

As to chucks, there are a lot of alternatives for holding your work, but nothing takes so much drudgery off your hands as the purchase of a chuck. Further, your choice of jaws can also make many things much less time-consuming. My candidates for most versatile

I agree with Darrell too--the key is in the sharpness of the tools and the sharpness of the mind. You don't have to have a bazillion dollars worth of accessories to make good wood turnings. Get some instruction, and some good sharp tools, and start in making your own mistakes.

It's a world of fun.

Walt C

Great website with lots of useful info, thanks for the link. I've seen the Nova chucks when hunting around on the web. Maybe I'll take a closer look.

-jj

Got a beginners woodturners book last night and started reading. Hope to put tool to grinder and then tool to wood this week.

I have a lot of scrap hard maple to practice on.

-jj

JJ.. welcome to the turning addiction... it makes crack seem inexpensive and not very time consuming.. *g*

I highly recommend a good chuck, (I love my 2 Oneway Talons), but I did survive my 1st 20 years or so of casual turning without one... so if money is an object, wait a while on the chuck..

You're going to find yourself spending that money on a lot of other stuff, as the habit grows, including a "step up" lathe, so keep the checkbook locked..

4 in this group people that I bothered a LOT while I was learning the basics were George, Darrell, Leo and Bill Grumbine... the one thing they have in common is an intuitive ability to teach or describe how they do something, like hold a chisel to wood... ( sounds pretty basic, but I had no idea how bad I was until I found out HOW to hold it..lol )

Add tools as you need them... some things that you'll probably collect is an assortment of sand paper, a few specialty chisels, maybe a power sanding setup, etc... PLEASE add a face shield and set of safety glasses if your shop is without them... IMHO, one of the best investments you can make is DVDs on turning... you watch them, think you understand them, turn a bit and watch them a few more times and understand them even more.. *g*

A great jump start if you want to turn bowls is Bill's DVD.. I wish that I'd watched it before I learned the hard way and it's changed the way I turn bowls... His web site is another of the great places to learn, also:

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

Mac, what did you use to hold blanks to the headstock before you got a chuck? Seems like screwing it to a face plate would leave holes in the finished bowl (sorry if I'm being too newbyish). I did see this "turner's tape" at Lee Valley. Is this really a good alternative to screwing the blank to the faceplate or mounting it in a chuck? Seems kind of scary unless the blank is pretty low mass.

For practice, I'll just uses screws and the faceplate because I'm sure I'll be generating a fair amount of throwaway stuff, so no problem.

Totally agree on the face shield and glasses. I have a face shield hung near my grinders, and I have an assortment of safety glasses strategically placed near other equipment so I don't have to hunt (or at least not as much anyway).

Just went to Bill's website. Looks like another great source of info, thanks. Bowl turning is what I what I want to do mostly, so maybe I will just buy his DVD.

JJ Just to chime in again, the easiest way to turn a bowl is to rough between centers, put Anchorseal or equivalent on the end grain to ease drying pressures and let it rest for a few months. Very quickly you build up a stash of dryed blanks to finish. For that finish turning use a glue block with hot glue and away you go. These days I find that I use my chuck more for spindle turning than for bowls. There are pages on my web site on roughing and finish turning bowls.

I'll second the safety glasses and face shield. I'm just starting with this myself and teaching myself as I go along. I was turning a mallet wet with just safety glasses. I was using the parting tool and had cut in to the point on both the head and tail end where there was still 3/4" left when it suddenly came flying off. I didn't realize what happened for a while but I had a pretty good cut on my nose. Fortunately nothing worse but that cut was very self evident all during Christmas. You can still see it but only when you look close.

Safety glasses and face shield.

And to add insult to injury, the mallet split.

I started with the face plates that came with my Shopsmith... short, fat screws into the bottom of the wood..." graduated" to using turned scrap as sacrificial blocks to bolt onto face plate and glue stock on to it.. (on fashioned glue & paper, I'd try hot glue now) I also played with screw chucks and stuff until I got my 1st Talon ..

I've used turner's tape, but IMO it's mostly for reversing and finishing a bowl that you can't hold any other way... not safe or secure, in my experience, just delays the launch until you're relaxed and not suspecting it.. *lol*

As Darrell suggests, a lot of bowls are started between centers, too...

yep.. I "thought about" getting Bill's DVD for about a year.. I really wish that I'd gotten it right away because I had NO idea how badly I needed it.. lol

Mac