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Roughing gouges, how are they sized?

Jon Murphy

Jon Murphy

Joined
Jan 9, 2011
Messages
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Location
Englishtown, NJ
I know the sizing of most gouges, the English flute to flute and the American round stock diameter - but for the life of me I can't find a standard for the spindle roughing gouges. I have two, both Benjamin's Best from PSI, but I bought them so long ago I have no idea of their nominal sizes. One is 3/4" outer diameter and 1/2" between the inner flutes, the other 1" outer and 3/4" between flutes.

I am looking for a larger SRG, but not gigantic as I'm on a 12" midi lathe. The PSI catalogue is no help - the picture of their 3/4" matches my larger one, but the picture of their 1" looks just like the picture of their 2". I'd like to get an SRG that is about 1 1/4" between inner flutes, give or take, but as I have to order on-line I (no vendor near me) I have no way of knowing the actual sized except by guessing from the pictures in the catalogues.

Perhaps the best answer to this would be for several of you who have SRGs from different makers to measure them and contrast that to the nominal size. This thread could then become a general answer to all with the same question. If it turns out that the nominal size and the actual measurements flute to flute (or OD) are consistent among the makers then we'll have a standard, but if Crown, Sorby, Hamlet, BB, etc. turn out to be different then we'll know that also.

Best, Jon
 
my larger roughing gouge is about the size you say. I think I can still find it. All my stuff is packed in a storage container but I had to do a demo and believe I packed that gouge. I bought it from Klingspor when I was traveling through there one day. I'll try to remember to look this morning.
 
I have a Sorby SRG that is not quite 1 1/2" on the exterior and 1 1/8" inside. I don't know what they call it, but I'll bet that you can go to their website to find out. I find that it is just right for any spindle turning that I do from pens to large end-grain vases. If I were doing huge columns then I might need something larger.

About the pictures ... don't depend on them for accuracy. Online catalogs often have pictures that are representational for tools of a particular style especially if the manufacturer didn't provide pictures for each tool.
 
I just checked. They split the difference and call it a 1 1/4" SRG. Their other SRG is 3/4". I have a small Crown SRG that was part of a set that is probably 3/4" and it's too small for most of my needs.
 
Gents, thank you for the responses - and sorry for the delay but I was off line a few days. My guess is that Bill's response (Sorby "splits the difference") may tell us that there is no standard nomenclature. That is logical as some SRGs are relatively flat (almost a Continental gouge) and others are deep U's.

I don't want to spring for the bucks for the Sorby, although the size seems to be what I'm looking for. Thompson's SRG is really out of line in price for the purpose ($199), but I love his gouge tools from round stock. Rather than chase the various makers for exact specs I think I take Doug's advice and drive down to PSI one of these days to check out the tools. I've been there before, and his estimate of the distance is on target - an hour to the main facility, where I've gone for repairs to my PSI lathe, plus another ten minutes to the retail facility.

I'm willing to spend on the best for some tools, my two main skews are Lacer Ubers bought unhandled and most of my gouges are Thompson's unhandled - but for things like SRGs and scrapers I'll go with the PSI versions. They are M2 steel, although badly handled and ground. I regrind all my tools anyway (Doug Thompson has kindly sold me some unground gouges for my "bottom gouges" that I grind to about an 80 dg. bevel). I re-handle the PSIs and shape them to taste. Too many tool makers/vendors sell too many special tools - which are merely different grinds of the same stock - for high prices. There are only so many shapes of the flute groove for bowl and spindle gouges. The bowl gouges are V or U and deep, the spindles are about 50% or shallower - standard, detail, or shallow detail. The rest is all how you grind them.

Pardon the ramble, it is a pet peeve of mine.

For Doug, I was in your town a few months ago for a memorial service. Mona Peyton, wife of Murray Peyton who is an old friend and college classmate at Princeton, died in December. The Peyton's were long term residents of Pennington and active in community affairs. The memorial was at the Pennington Presbyterian Church on South Main. Murray is a retired teacher of Latin (first job was at Punahao School in Hawaii, were Obama went). Not sure if he ever taught in the Pennington School system, but I know he was active on the School Board. A fine man and a fine lady who brought up their children in Pennington.

I have to add this for the wood turners. We of the PU class of 1957 who are in the NJ vicinity gather twice a year, for the spring reunion at the college and in the fall for the PU/Harvard or PU/Yale game (whichever is home in mid November)- the rest of the class scattered around the world gathers every five years for the spring reunion. I always bring some wood turnings to the gatherings, little things for fun. Last spring we had a massive attendance for the off year reunion, the class officers had gently pointed out that it would be '57's 57th (and the underlying theme was that we would lose many before the 60th). I'd promised tops in orange and black for everyone - as the sign-ups grew I had to divert from bowls and hollow forms to mass production of Tiger Tops, but they were well received and our late seventies lads were competing in spinning them.

Oops, got off topic a bit - my intent was to speak of the Peytons. At the football game class gathering last fall I brought a bunch of tops for the Peyton grandchildren, but Mona wasn't there. A month before she had been at a memorial for a classmate, but didn't look well. I happened to have a stylized turned bird on a stick with me. I gave it to Murray to give to Mona, I had no idea how serious her condition was.

I wandered again, but I am always amazed at how simple turnings well shaped can affect people when they are a gift. I have a fond hope that Mona got some smiles when she looked at her bird.

Best, Jon
 
Question answered

Again I thank you all for the responses, I now have an answer as to how SRGs are measured. They aren't measured exactly. I bought the PSI Benjamin's Best 2" SRG and it is approximately the 1 1/2" that I wanted. The outer width is about 2" and the between flutes is about 1 5/8". My BB that measured about 3/4" between flutes must be their 1". The BB is deep U shape, almost a half circle. Others are shallower. I can understand why the measurements aren't a standard when they are forging flat stock. I also now see the danger of a snapped tang when roughing large heavy pieces, there is a lot of area to grab compared with the thickness of the tang. If I had a big lathe and were roughing out thick table legs (say 8") I don't think I'd use a flat tanged SRG.
 
I'm curious as to why you want a larger tool. I purchased the bigger one and never use it. I thought bigger would be better but for me it isn't. I only use a roughing gouge for spindle turning and so do most others which is why we started refering to them as spindle roughing gouges. When used on faceplate turnings they are dangerous, prone to catches, and that's why so many people have broken the tangs. If I was doing a lot of large spindles I think I might use my big gouge more but I did a dozen 15" long by 6" diameter spindles for a client and my smaller gouge worked perfectly.
anyone else like or dislike the bigger spindle roughing gouges.
 
Jon,
Almost all manufacturers size spindle gouges by the diameter of the tool.

The manufacturers are split on bowl gouges. Many size the tools by the width of the flute which is usually an 1/8" less than the bar diameter.
The rest size the tools by the bar diameter.

About 6 years ago AAW approached the manufactures about standardizing.
They were all happy to standardize to the way they did it. So nothing came of it.

Retailers like Packard and Craft supplies make it easy to know what you are getting.

A long time ago I replaced a 1/2" skew that I loved so much it had gotten way too short with the
Identical tool and identical manufacturer. The tool that came was wider by an 1/8 of an inch.
Just did not work as well for me on ornament finials. I asked Brad Packard about it. He said that manufactures by their steel from other s and they can't always control
the exact size. In a few cases it is a metric to English mismatch.

As Jon said. Be sure to use the spindle roughing gouge on spindles.
Unless you are and expert the SRG create catastrophic catches on bowls.

Work safely
Have fun,
Al
 
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I think I have one SRG that was with my original first set of tools that I got from Craft Supplies. Maybe 1 inch. I have developed a bad attitude towards tools with flimsy tangs on them. I can feel it being loose in the handle. The ones from round bar stock are far better. Larger is not always better if for no other reason, you can get overpowered by accidentally getting too much steel into the wood at one time.

robo hippy
 
Jon, you said that you are using a midi lathe and wound up buying a 2" SRG. If I were turning architectural columns on a long bed lathe then I might consider an SRG that large, but for spindles on a midi lathe a one inch SRG seems to be a much better match.

The trouble with a large SRG is that it is large ... often too large to work on smaller things, and as Robo Hippy says, big tools can take big bites of wood if you're not careful. Whatever you do, don't use it when turning face grain (bowls or anything where the grain runs perpendicular to the spin axis)). Also, keep the tool overhang as close as you can while getting a piece round. Anything more than an inch when making interrupted cuts would be scary to me.

I have a Sorby SRG that is about 1⅛" inside measurement and it is as large as I would ever want and I have used it to rough the exterior shape of some end grain vases up to ten inches diameter. I am sure that it would work for something much larger if I wanted to make something larger.
 
The biggest concern on big roughing gouges is the tang. You have this giant tool, but just a little bit of it goes into the handle. If they don't get the heat treating right, the tangs can snap off. Of particular concern to me would be the Chinese imports. They put crazy small tangs on those big tools.
 
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