Rounding Question

Hoo boy howdy, that was a learning experience.

Was gonna just put a chunk of 2X4 in the lathe, but then decided to cut down a piece of scrap to 2X2" by about 12". Chucked it in, and cranked up the lathe. Then cranked the hand planer down to the shallowest cut. Stood to one side, and had at it.

Whee, no safety problems at all, and loads of wood shavings pumping out. Whee.

Only one minor problem. Seems like, not being supported by each end of the sole, the blades are taking more wood than the seting. Either that, or they're just taking it off really fast. Whoo, it did round it off fast. Like about .0005 second, or so it seemed. Being handheld it did leave the surface a bit rough, but that'd be no prob to smooth.

I'll probably try this again later. But, unless I've got a huge chunk of wood in there, I figure I'll probably make some type of jig to hold the planer and aloow it to take the shallow cuts it's actually intended for - maybe some type of frame, adjustable a fraction of an inch at a time. Otherwise, I'll be ending up with a rounded piece of wood that's quite a bit smaller around than I started with - really fast. Definite possibilities tho, definitely. Should be no problem making a jig to do this, the only fussy part would be getting it square to the line between the centers, and even that shouldn't be too hard. Maybe bolted to the front of the lathe stand, and folds down when not being used. No prob.

There was absolutely no "pull" on the planer. So, that I don't figure is any safety problem. However, it cuts so fast you might wind up going riight thr your piece of wood befoe you even realize it - hence the need for some type of a jig.

All in all, very interesting. I consider thie hand power planer and chainsaw as precision woodworking tools, that are exciting to work with.

Anyone trying this does so at their own risk. I won't be responsible for any injuries sufferred. Remember, I'm a trained professional. LMAO

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

Actually, the wood rasp worked pretty nicely. Get a good grip on both ends, don't apply a huge amount of pressure, and no prob. I've had the gouge jerk on knots, or hard sections - don't have that problem with the wood rasp. So, until I actually get to trying it, I don't see any problem using the power planer the same way.

I'll have to agree that this can be done. I did it a few times with a strange "lathe" that was given to me (this may not be polite company but I'll refrain from using the words I normally used when talking about it). It scared the snot out of me because the slowest speed was 3000 rpms and it went up from there. The ride with the rasp was rough and the results weren't pretty by any stretch of the imagination. After buying a real (but small) lathe I don't see any percentage in using a rasp since tools designed for turning do a better job about as quickly -- although if looks don't matter at all, the rasp may be faster. After getting my nose bloodied by a mallet head that flew off the lathe I learned that I need to use caution about what I do. That and to use a face shield. The rasp just didn't feel safe. And a trip to the emergency room pretty much blows whatever time savings there was. Actually, a trip to the emergency room just blows.

Mon, Jun 12, 2006, 6:21pm snipped-for-privacy@nothere.com (Scratch=A0Ankle) doth sayeth: I'll have to agree that this can be done. I did it a few times The ride with the rasp was rough and the results weren't pretty After getting my nose bloodied by a mallet head that flew off the lathe I learned that I need to use caution about what I do. That and to use a face shield.

I don't know if I'll be using the rasp much, but didn't have any problems at all. Yep, the surface it left was rough, but I'd epected that - didn't figure on taking the wood down anymore than to round it. Used the lathe tools after that.

I don't turn mallet heads. I turn one-piece malles. And, I've never had anything fly out of the lathe, I make sure it's in tight, and recheck every once in awhile, and re-tighten if needed. I always use a face mask, if for nothing else, to keep the shavins out of my face.

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

Uhhhhh........is your life insurance paid up? Got plenty of health insurance? Cell phone at the ready to call 911? Go ahead then, give it a shot!

Barry

JOAT, you're a man among men if you pull it off. I'll keep my fingers crossed for ya, as I don't think you'll be discouraged from doing it no matter what anyone says. Myself, I think I'd get the wood round first, then use the plane, but I'm overly fond of my appendages.

Good luck- and make sure someone else is around when you try it out.

Well, maybe. Certainly was over in the wreck. But he has to give up his tourist status first and take up residence. We got standards to keep, dontcha know...

...Kevin

Yep -- the words "death wish" came to mind as I read the initial post.

Bill

Barry N. Turner wrote:

An alternative is some of that really knarly sand paper in the bargain boxes...

I just got a 20 pound box of roll ends from Klingspor and a strip of that 80 grit with a sponge behind it removes wood pretty fast..

Mac

Good stuff to grip in your haemostat and sand the inside of "hollow forms" if you're so inclined.

Mon, Jun 12, 2006, 9:43pm (EDT-1) snipped-for-privacy@business.org (Prometheus) doth sayeth: JOAT, you're a man among men if you pull it off. I'll keep my fingers crossed for ya, as I don't think you'll be discouraged from doing it no matter what anyone says. Myself, I think I'd get the wood round first, then use the plane, but I'm overly fond of my appendages. Good luck- and make sure someone else is around when you try it out.

You mean I shoulda had someone with me when I tried it? LMAO

Nah, I knew it would work, just didn't know how well. It worked alright, just took off a lot more wood, a whole lot faster than I'd figured on. Just the thing if you want to make something small out of a large chunk of wood tho. LOL

With those two blades spinning at about a zillion revs a minute, I figure there's no chance of a snag. I know for a fact a lathe tool will jump at times, especially when it hits a knot.

I'm thinking it could be a usable tool, with an adjustable jig. Something along the line of a frame, attached to the front of the lathe stand, that you could adjust to the amount you wanted to take off. Fix it in place, then just make light touches, until you got down to the frame, then run the planer sideways along the frame. Then flip the frame back, and proceed with regular lathe tools. At first I'd thought about a frame that would adjust by small increments to take small cuts, then readjust for another cut. But, that would be too fussy, and not needed.

The piece that I did, even with pulling the planer back and lookit at the cuts it was taken, didn't take more than about 30 seconds to take it down to about 1". Fast. I would definitely make a jig, especially if I were ronding anything not very large. Hmmm, I've got some car parts, I've always wanted to make a big lathe, and I've got some pretty big trees I'd like gotten rid of. Hmmm. Heh heh.

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

Mon, Jun 12, 2006, 11:02pm (EDT-4) snipped-for-privacy@acsalaska.net (Kevin=A0Miller) doth sayeth: Well, maybe. Certainly was over in the wreck. But he has to give up his tourist status first and take up residence. We got standards to keep, dontcha know...

Used to post here every once in awhile, but that's been long ago. But, don't worry bout it, I may not be back - more fun over on rec.woodworking. Don't wanna raise the standards here too high, don'tcha know?

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

Well, just within yelling distance.

Wasn't the blade I was thinking of- it was the roughing part of it. I suppose it depends on the blank, but sometimes I've got one big corner sticking off that I'm too lazy to take back out and saw down with the chainsaw. I guess I had visions of that corner whacking the top of the plane, and either busting it, or flipping a running power tool into your leg. I've used a regular plane on the lathe, and that worked great- but it was after the peice was roughed out.

Glad you pulled it off, though. Fairly impressive, really.

Now that *is* a good idea... A guy could do that with a plane iron on a slide as well- not as fast as the power planer, but a nifty idea, especially for a consistant taper or column without screwing around with the skew.

Well, I'll still leave it to you- but I'm glad it's working for ya.

Wed, Jun 14, 2006, 11:20am (EDT-1) snipped-for-privacy@business.org (Prometheus) doteth ponder: sometimes I've got one big corner sticking off that I'm too lazy to take back out and saw down with the chainsaw. I guess I had visions of that corner whacking the top of the plane, and either busting it, or flipping a running power tool into your leg.

I would think with one big corner sticking up, it'd unbalance the wood enough to make me nervous. I think I'd be more inclined to use the planer on that with the lathe off. However, if it wasn't totally unbalanced, I think that lowering the running planer on it - slowly - it would be fine. That planer chews up a LOT of wood fast. But that's the nice part, it zips right thru a knot without slowing down.

Actually, it pretty much stops as soon as the trigger is released. So, even if it did flip on you, I think it'd probably be stopped by the time it got to you. Even then, it'd have to hit you on the small portion that exposes the blade, and at th e worst, it ony goes out 1/8". Personally, I consider it loads less dangerous than a chainsaw, or a circular saw someon's locked the guard up, or even a power drill.

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

OK everybody let's show JOAT how much we appreciate his participation over here on the quiet side. Let's all send him an email telling him how much we'd like him to stay! ;o)

Let's YOU send him an email first. :o)

Wed, Jun 14, 2006, 3:55pm (EDT-3) snipped-for-privacy@easystreet.com (Owen=A0Lowe) doth mumble: OK everybody let's show JOAT how much we appreciate his participation over here on the quiet side. Let's all send him an email telling him how much we'd like him to stay! =A0 ;o)

Hi Owen. I'm waving hello. Can you see me? Guess how many fingers I'm using.

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

Well, maybe I will try it out sometime- though I'm pretty lax about prepping my blanks, and the roughing phase is usually kind of an adventure. What kind of finish does it leave you with? That might be more important than how fast you can chew off wood. Sometimes that roughing gouge pulls the knots right out, and leaves a big hole.

There is that, part of the reason I don't prep that much is that I'm not a huge fan of using the chainsaw to knock corners off bowl blanks- when you put it into perspective that way, it probably isn't much worse than having a blank start jumping around with 16" of spinning blade within reach of your legs. That's not even considering the time or two I used the table saw for that job (That is now on my list of stupid things not to do again.)

Thu, Jun 15, 2006, 12:16am (EDT-1) snipped-for-privacy@business.org (Prometheus) sayeth: Well, maybe I will try it What kind of finish does it leave you with?

At your own risk, of course. Actually, I'm completely comfortable with trying it again. Well, I was working to my left, because I didn't feel like pulling the lathe out far. So, I didn't have the control I would have otherwise. The surface was a bit rough, but not bad. However, if I'd used a jig of some sort so I could have slid the planer back and forth, the finish would have been pretty smooth. Speculation at this point, because it's my first experience with one of those thingies. Doesn't matter to me tho, because I'd figured on finishing up with lathe tools anyway.

JOAT Politician \Pol`i*ti"cian\, n. Latin for career criminal

That's so nice of you Joat. I'm sorry about the fingers, didja chop off the other 4 in a lathe accident?