Turning "freehand" on a metal lathe ??

[magruder]

Who is turning briar on a metal lathe "freehand" the way one would on a wood lathe- hand held tools?
I have an adapter for the metal lathe to make a tool rest,
but I cannot seem to turn anything at all. Either my tools are not sharp enough for the briar (it's hard!) or the rest will not get close enough to the work -
or something else. :dunno:
It am pretty sure the height is correct for the tool rest.
Who is freehand turning w/a metal lathe and how are you accomplishing it please?
TIA

[KurtHuhn]

That *should* be as simple as it is on a wood lathe. Put the toolrest parallel to the surface you want to work, raise it so that the chisel will connect at about the midpoint, turn up the speed to the desired range, and commence the cuttin'.

What problems are you seeing? No cutting action at all? Sporadic cutting? Bad cutting? Got an action pic?

[magruder]

I get catches all the time. I sharpen the tool, but it still catches again.
I think I am either not making a good edge on the tool or it is dulling really fast.
Ideas?

[NvilleDave]

I get catches all the time. I sharpen the tool, but it still catches again.
I think I am either not making a good edge on the tool or it is dulling really fast.
Ideas?

Kurt would probably know best but I'm going to guess your tool rest isn't close enough to the work. It should be almost touching your work piece.

[KurtHuhn]

That' absolutely right. The toolrest should be within a hair's breadth of touching the workpiece - but close enough that your chisel sits solidly on the toolrest. You don't want he gouge to slide backwards due to the bevel along the bottom edge being the resting point on the toolrest.

Is "catching" when the handle of the tool wants to rotate upwards out of your hand? If so, I'll wager that either, your toolrest isn't close enough, or your toolrest is too high and you're going at the workpiece at a downward angle. The second case, if it's so, isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it takes some practice to do right.

Whan I turn a bowl or shank on the wood lathe, I actually go at it from an entirely different direction. I turn the toolrest so that it's perpendicular to the bedway - as in the point of my tool will be pointing at the chuck. From there I use a thick cutoff tool to make a cylinder by digging into the block from the top of the bowl. After that, I can turn the toolrest so that it's now parallell with the bedway, and I can refine the shape of the bowl into whatever it's going to be. It's a lot faster and lot less dangerous to do it like that.

If you guys want, this weekend I can make a video of this process. I've been meaning to do that for a while now anyway.

[achduliebe]

Kurt,

That would be great if you could do that. I would really like to see that.

[LexKY_Pipe]

The video is a great idea Kurt ! Thanks :thumb:

[magruder]

a video would be wonderful :thumb:

[Nick]

Cool idea Kurt! I would have never thought to approach the bowl from the front. I'll have to try that one of these days!

[ArtGuy]

Holy cow! I was just thinking this morning..... I might pm Kurt and try to get him to do a turning demo on video since he also uses the oneway chuck and jet mini lathe... :thumb:

[KurtHuhn]

I *really* need to get that video finished and uploaded. I haven't even looked at it yet. One thing or another grabs my attention, and off I go on another tangent....

I'll try to have it done this weekend. But, fair warning, if that new blasting setup arrives before Friday, I might get nothing but blasting accomplished.

[Tyler]

Steve,

What kind of chisel are you using to turn? A catch is a very common problem if you do not cut at the correct angle. The key to smooth, clean turning is to always make sure the bevel of the chisel is rubbing the wood. In other words, the angle of cut is the same as the angle of the bevel of the chisel. (That is probably not clear at all, and I don't think I'm enough of an ASCII artist to draw up what I'm talking about.)

Before I even had the money to buy a lathe, I went to my local library and checked out a few videos on wood turning. When I got my lathe, I still didn't have briar so I turned a few things from oak firewood. Using the tips I learned on the videos I was very successful. From there, turning a pipe was easy. I don't think I could do it nearly as well were it not for that initial "training". I'd highly recommend trying the library. Any video for beginning turners will show the bevel thing that I tried to explain above, and will teach you how to avoid catches.

To summarize, I'd bet your issue is not a dull chisel, but the angle you are bring the tool in to cut. This can be a rest position issue, but one can usually bring the chisel in at the right angle even from less convenient rest positions.

FWIW, I have quit redirecting my site to this one (I figure eveyone has figured it out by now), and my site is fully accessible again. As such, you can watch me turn on my site.

turning video

This was a really stupic shape to illustrate turning with, since there is so little turning to be done, but it was what I was making at the time. :dunno:

Tyler

P.S. Call me if you'd like. I can probably say what I mean better than I can write it.

[Frank]

I guess I'm just seconding what Tyler said, but if you've never done any wood turning, then watch his videos, go grab any scrap wood to practice on, even short lengths of 2x2, until you get the "feel" of it. Starting out trying to turn a stummel could cost you quite a few hunks of expensive briar if you're not familiar with wood turning.
I've a done a small amount of freehand wood turning on my metal lathe, but I'm still nervous about it. Takes practice.

If you have cable TV, there are (or were) a couple of short, but very informative series on the DIY channel called "Wood Turning Basics" & "Wood Turning Techniques" by an experienced wood turner named Dave Hout. I recorded the shows, but have yet to burn them to disc.

Frank.