Newbie Turning Questions

Hello All and Happy New Year,

I have a couple of questions being new to turning. Currently the only thing I have done is to try and make square stock round and other things to get a feel for the lathe. My main projects at this time are going to be turning pens. How do you figure out what speed to turn at, is it different for the different species of wood, or is hardwood hardwood? When I am turning what type of shvings should I expect; actual shavings, dust or what?

Also can I figure out what I am doing wrong based on what is coming off of my turned piece? Any and all suggestions and info would be greatly appreciated.

I'm never lost, someone is always telling me where to go...

Reply to
Andy K.
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Hi Andy,

We're always ready to give a newbie more advice than he can possibly use. Welcome to the sport of wood turning.

Speed--the faster the wood turns, the smoother the cut. Run the lathe as fast as feels comfortable. If you feel uncomfortable, slow it down. For pens, you should be able to run it pretty fast. I do chisel handles at about 1500 rpm. You will find that each piece of wood seems to want its own speed.

Shavings. They should squirt off the chisel like Silly String. If they aren't, your chisel is probably dull. It may FEEL sharp to you, but how the shavings come off is the real indicator of sharpness.

My indicator of technique is noise. Actually the absences thereof. If all I hear is the "whish" of wood passing by the chisel, all is well. If I get squeal, chatter or growling, there's a problem.

Cut lots of trial blocks, and when you are done, you will KNOW what is good technique or bad.

Old Guy

Reply to
Old Guy

Turn as slow or as fast as is comfortable to you. Makes _no_ difference in the final surface, though turning faster makes more kinetic energy available to make you pay for an error. You simply adjust your feed rate so that you're not pushing laterally faster than the rotation can remove the wood.

As you go to round you want to whittle your way in stages toward either end with your favorite flavor of tool. For squared pen blanks a straight chisel will do the whole thing from rough to buff, though some prefer to use the gouge to do the initial round, followed by the skew.

You want to turn with as little resistance against your hand as possible, so snug the rest up tight and hold the tool firmly on the rest from above. Interrupted shavings will give way to longer and longer as you approach round, which you should do in sweeps, as mentioned above, going in with a handle movement, then pushing along the rest as you get a bevel to reference. You'll want the shavings to twist as you work, and the longer they are, the smoother your surface will be. The shavings are your teacher, and they teach you through your hand and eye. Keep 'em long!

Reply to
George

Buy this book

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they have forgotten more about pen turning then most of us know

Reply to
Ralph E Lindberg

Happy New Year to you and all of the rest of the people who visit this newsgroup.

When I started turning some 20 years ago, I had a pile of maple and alder firewood that I started turning into cylinders. When the piece was round, I made beads the length of the piece. I then made coves on the top of each bead. I then made the wood round again. I repeated this process until the wood was wasted. Finally, when the beads were mostly good and the coves were pretty good, I tried turning something, like a tool handle. I made handles for all of my files and rasps. Then I tackled lamps for all of the ladies in my family (a total of six sets of table lamps).

The smaller the diameter of the spindle, the higher the speed can be. Pens turn best at about 2500 to 3000 rpm. For this I recommend a good sharp skew chisel. However, the harder the wood becomes, the better it responds to a scraper. African Blackwood (about the hardest wood in the world) for example works best with a scraper. But a scraper will tear the surface of softer hardwoods.

As others have said, the shavings tell the story. If your tool isn't sharp, you'll likely get dust. If the tool is sharp and applied to the wood properly, you will get shavings and the shavings will become longer as the wood become round.

Finally, I recommend turning spinning tops as a good project to gain tool control. You can turn them from a solid block. It is best if the piece of wood is mounted on a faceplate or in a chuck. Turn the wood round, then cut a taper to make the point that touches the floor when it is spinning. Then turn the top part of the spinner, and finally the stem of about 1/8" in diameter. I've turned several thousand of these over the years and is one of the first projects that I recommend for a beginner.

Welcome to the world of woodturning.

Fred Holder

Reply to
Fred Holder

PLAY!!!

Put a chunk of scrap on with the intention of turning it into shavings... no finished project in mind, no stress, just play with the tools..

Enjoy the sound and feel of the tool/wood interaction... try things that you might not if it was a $40 bowl blank or a olive candlestick...

Read your shavings, practice sharpening your chisels... make a mess and learn to be "alertly relaxed".. I don't think you can really turn well if you're too tight, you relax and get into the zone..

OH.. and spend a few minutes trying to get the big-ass grin off your face before going back into the house..

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

Reply to
mac davis

Hi Andy,

Here's a site with a nice chart. Hope it helps.

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Dan

Reply to
dan cordes

andy - a basic pen starts with a 3/4 inch square piece of wood - I'd turn at 2,000 to 3,000 RPM, it is actually easier to turn fast than slow. take light cuts. use a spindle gouge (3/8 inch is the size I use for pens) - do NOT make fancy pens at first - make the simple ones that are a knock off of the CROSS pen, and try to get the shape perfect - no ripples, bulges, etc - then make the one that is a copy of the Mont Blanc (they call it "euro" I think) - when you have those to shapes down right, you can decide what you want to do next. I haven't made pens in a while, when I did, I would put a small (about 1/10th inch) bulge near the tip to make them easier to hold - pens with lots of coves and beads are tiresome to look at and not comfortable for writing either (my opinion, others may differ). Also, stick with woods that have high contrast grain close together - zebra, cocobolo, etc - things like walnut and maple don't look good in pens. Bamboo is interesting, baltic birch plywood is interesting, but I found that teak, zebra wood, canary wood, and that kind of stuff sold the best (and as gifts, when given a choice, those were choosen first). Also, eschew pencils - no one seems to want them.

Reply to
William Noble

One thing I always keep repeating to my students is "keep your bevel rubbing". Which means always start a cut with the bevel, that's the ground surface on the back of the tool that leads up to the sharp edge, keep it rubbing against the wood. So that the cutting edge of the tool is always supported by the bevel whenever it is cutting. This will help your control of the tool, it will help cut down skewbacks, it should help get rid of those annoying ridges and give you a smoother finish. Good Luck. Hotfoot

Reply to
rosemary Wright

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