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Thread Chasing?

Tom Albrecht

Tom Albrecht

Joined
Feb 8, 2014
Messages
1,219
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659
Location
Evanston, IL USA
Anybody here into thread chasing?

It looks like something I'd like to get into in the "Standard" way, using hand tools, without the aid of a router and a jig.

Am I too old school?

Is there a big learning and waste curve?
 
Tom, I'm just a little ahead of you in the 'wanting to get into it' on hand thread chasing. I've seen a couple of demos, watched a couple of videos, and am aware of the issues, wood being the toughest one with which to deal. There is a free video on hand thread chasing available on the Craftsupplies web site that one of the Batty's made some time ago, but which is pretty clear. There are a few demonstrators around who present classes and I would recommend attending at least one before you get started. There are varied opinions on which set of tools to get, or even making your own set out of bolts. If you take a class, you'll at least have one reliable person giving you his or her answer on the various issues and showing the several key tricks. Then it's practice, practice, practice, maybe on pvc first because it's cheap and easy to thread.
 
Thread chasing is fun.
Once you get it it's like riding a bike.
Maybe someone in you area can show you.

I did a lot of threaded boxes a long time ago. I am no expert and am not confident enough to teach thread chasing
I can make pieces that screw together.

I learned by watching and talking to Alan Batty at an AAW trade show.
I bought a set of thread chasers and the auxiliary rest Batty used.
Went home chucked up a spindle struck threads turned them off and repeated until the wood was too small.
Then went for threaded lid and got it.

Not sure I could have learned as much from a video as I did standing next to Alan for 20 minutes.
Alan stressed
beveling the leading edge before you strike a thread.
Running the lathe at a speed where you can see the spindle threads.
Cutting an escape if the threads go towards a shoulder
Using a 16 or 18 tpi set to learn on
 
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Here is the link to Alan's video. I was lucky enough to get a 3 day workshop with both Alan and Stuart some years back. Alan had a threaded sphere that was inside another sphere with 12 holes (similar to soccer ball pattern), that was made from Ivory. Truly a master.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0iEd0kD0S4

robo hippy
 
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