Is a 3/8" Spindle Gouge 1/2" In Diameter ?

[John Simmons]

Received my Robert Sorby 67HS Tool Set this week.

I'm making a tool caddy for these.

I was surprised that the 3/8" Spindle Gouge measures 1/2" in diameter. Is that normal?

The 3/8" Bowl Gouge is 3/8" in diameter (10 mm)

I'm fine with what I received, I'm just curious if it's labeled incorrect, or if I just don't know what I'm looking at.

Photo's:

 

[hockenbery]

The bowl gouge is the one with the 1/2 diameter.
Generally English bowl gouges are listed at 1/8” less than the diameter of the bar.

In the beginning they all look alike. After a while you will spot the bowl gouges and spindle Gouges from how the flute is ground.

Bowl gouge the deep flute is ground into the top of the round bar.

Spindle gouge the top 1/2 or 1/3 of the bar is ground away and the shallow flute is ground into the bottom half of the bar.

These are PowerPoint slides I show in a demo I do called gouges 101
http://aaw.hockenbery.net/tgouge intro.pdf

Also I recommend the the guide to gouges article by Joe Larese American woodturner Page 21 October 2011. It is also on the AAW website as pdf.
https://c.ymcdn.com/sites/www.woodt...les/AGuidetoGouges.pdf?hhSearchTerms="Gouges"

 

[John Simmons]

The bowl gouge is the one with the 1/2 diameter....

Thanks for the detailed reply hockenberry, much appreciated.

 

[JeffSmith]

I thought the distinction between English and american gouge sizes was that american gouges use the diameter of the rod where the brittish use the width of the flute. Either way, as Al points out it amounts to about 1/8th inch difference for most commonly used sizes.

 

[john lucas]

I have also read that some brands of British gouges measure from the inside of one side of the flute to the outside of the metal on the other side. This would make a 3/8" gouge even narrower than one measuring the width of the flute. Most of what I have seen are what Al said which is flute inside for British tools and Shaft diameter for American.

 

[Leo Van Der Loo]

The English have used the flute size as the measurement of their gouges, the reason for it was that gouges used to be forged and large gouges would have thicker walls/metal, while smaller gouges used thinner metal, but in either case it was the flute size that was the important part and used as the size of it, and they still use that measure.

 

[Bill Boehme]

There was an article in the British magazine, Woodturning, a number of years back that gave several theories including the most plausible one mentioned by Leo on the genesis of the way that the British measure bowl gouges. I think the conclusion was that the explanations weren't justifications for the way that bowl gouges are made today. The article also posed the rhetorical question why couldn't it be just simplified to stating the bar size as done by their American cousins.

 

[hockenbery]

The article also posed the rhetorical question why couldn't it be just simplified to stating the bar size as done by their American cousins.

Of course the English invented the modern bowl gouge and Irishman Liam O’Neil came up with the side ground gouge. There is something to be said for tradition.

It also makes sense to talk about tools in the their functional dimension.

When you buy a wrench or a socket do you want it measured outside dimension or working dimension.

Probably makes more sense to ask the johnie come latlelies to switch to the English nomenclature.

 

[John Simmons]

But... both tools are gouges in the photo above.

Both are marked as 3/8".

The Bowl Gouge does indeed have a flute width at the top of about 3/8".

The Spindle Gouge is nowhere near 3/8", it's less than 5/16".

Whatever the "rule" is, you would think it would be consistent for all gouges... not just "Bowl Gouges"?

 

[hockenbery]

Whatever the "rule" is, you would think it would be consistent for all gouges... not just "Bowl Gouges"?

At a round off level it is consistent.
The 3/8 spindle gouge has a flute close to 3/8
The 3/8 bowl gouge has a flute close to 3/8
Gouges are in steps of an 1/8”

Also if you took the image of the tape measure from the background and moved it to the foreground you get some distortion.

Whether it is significant or not I don’t know. Something to check.

 

[Bill Boehme]

@hockenbery
In 1966 Jerry Glaser introduced a bowl gouge made from high vanadium HSS round bar stock. That was only two or three years after Peter Child first developed a bowl gouge from M2 HSS round bar stock. Maybe Jerry was a "Johnny come only a tad later".

Deciding what "functional dimension" means could be a sticky wicket. A bowl gouge made from ⅝" bar stock has more cutting edge than one made from ½" bar stock. That sounds like an argument in favor of using actual bar diameter. Also, a bowl gouge made from ⅝" bar stock is more rigid than one made from ½" bar stock. Functionally speaking, that also seems like an important consideration also favoring actual dimension.

Modern bowl gouges made from round HSS bar stock was a significant departure from the old continental gouges made from flat tool steel bar stock. I think that there's a fine line between tradition and stodgy.

@John Simmons
Your observation about the flute width on the spindle gouge is correct. I think that every new turner asks the question about bowl and spindle gouge size and for better or worse it is what it is. They're metric and you have probably noticed that the spindle gouge is marked 10 mm which is a little larger ⅜", but it's still called a ⅜" spindle gouge.

 

[Leo Van Der Loo]

Modern bowl gouges made from round HSS bar stock was a significant departure from the old continental gouges made from flat tool steel bar stock,

I agree with that, and then who’s going to be the first to drop that measurement giving you less than before

I think that there’s a fine line between tradition and stodgy.--------------NOoooooooooo

What often is overlooked when comparing spindle and bowl gouges is that the spindle gouge has a much lower profile than a bowl gouge so you can get right in narrow cuts when spindle turning

yes you get more ware from a ½” english gouge compared with any other made ½” bowl gouge

 

[hockenbery]

In 1966 Jerry Glaser introduced a bowl gouge made from high vanadium HSS round bar stock. That was only two or three years after Peter Child first developed a bowl gouge from M2 HSS round bar stock. Maybe Jerry was a "Johnny come only a tad later".

Jerry made a lot of advancements in gouge steel and came up with a different flute design but he didn’t come up with the idea for a bowl gouge from a round bar.

Deciding what "functional dimension" means could be a sticky wicket. A bowl gouge made from ⅝" bar stock has more cutting edge than one made from ½" bar stock. That sounds like an argument in favor of using actual bar diameter.

No argument if we only have bowl gouges.
If we want to compare the bussiness end of bowl gouges and spindle gouges what measure works best? For me it is the English measure.
A shallow flut cut into the bottom half of the bar is close to the bar diameter.
A deep flute cut into the top of a round bar is less than the bar diameter.

In the end it doesn’t make any difference to me what measures are used for bowls gouges. Be nice if all manufacturers used the same nomenclature.

 

[John Simmons]

At a round off level it is consistent.
The 3/8 spindle gouge has a flute close to 3/8
The 3/8 bowl gouge has a flute close to 3/8
Gouges are in steps of an 1/8”

Also if you took the image of the tape measure from the background and moved it to the foreground you get some distortion.

Whether it is significant or not I don’t know. Something to check.

And you sir are correct. The bar diameter differences obscures the fact that the flutes are actually nearly identical.


^^^ Spindle Gouge (Left) ----- Bowl Gouge (Right) ^^^
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^^^ Bowl Gouge ^^^
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^^^ Spindle Gouge ^^^
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[hockenbery]

This is a cool photo @John Simmons

 

[Bill Boehme]

John, the important difference between the two gouges is the shape of the flutes. While the width may be about the same, the spindle gouge flute has a very shallow circular arc while the bowl gouge flute has a deep elliptical or parabolic shape ... sometimes called a V shape. There is also a less common bowl gouge U shape flute that has nearly vertical sides and a broader curved bottom than the V shape.

The grinds used on bowl and spindle gouges are usually different from each other so that the two types of gouges are specialized and not very interchangeable for most purposes.

 

[John Simmons]

Thanks to all for their input on this..... back in the 70's.... every lathe tool dad had was flat. I remember using a skew, and a parting tool. That's about it.

 

[hockenbery]

Thanks to all for their input on this..... back in the 70's.... every lathe tool dad had was flat. I remember using a skew, and a parting tool. That's about it.

That is when the deep fluted bowl gouge from a round bar was just emerging
Most Bowl turners were using the long and strong forged gouges

By the 90s the deepfluted were ubiquitous

 

[Leo Van Der Loo]

As I started turning the Bowl gouge as we know it now did just not exist (late 50ish) bowl turners did use either hook tools, the Continental gouge or scrapers, for me it was self shop-made scrapers and I had a heck of a time to get an acceptable finish, the answer for me was hard dense tropical wood, I remember my first try using a scraper on a Red Cedar block, it survived just long enough to make heat in the forge